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THE POLICAL ECOIOMI OF SLAVERY; . 



OB, 



THE INSTITUTION CONSIDERED 



IN REGARD 



'to ITS INFLUENCE ON PUBLIC WEALTH AND THE GENERAL WELFARE. 



BT 



EDMUND RTJFFIN, OF VIRGimA. 



Printed by Lemuel Towers, • 



THE POLITICAL ECOIOMY OF SLAYERY; 



THE INSTITUTIOX CONSIDERED IX KEGARD TO ITS IXFLUEXCE 
ON PUBLIC WEALTH AND THE GEXERAL WELFARE. 



BY EDMUND RUFFIX, OF VIRGINIA. 



C7 1 ■ < ■ J J- r- . li/.ed and I'lontifiil, iiiul even ffenerallv indus- 

Slavery general tn Ancient tuiits — Causes o/^ f^:„„„ „, ,,'f..,. +1, „ ,. ^ e "* v. '""""> 

c; • ' ^ • til r J ^ J '^"O"^ count ly, thore are to be found, in the 

alavcru — Averawn to labor of de'/raded'i^^^.^^t. „, „i^"'„rr • i i •. ^ • T- 

, ^ J j^ , , •' ■,• . |lo-\\est grade ot Irc-e njlmbitants, many indi- 

classes and of barbarous communities. ,r,M,,oio 4-„..,;i;^o „„j ^ ■*• /••' 

-' _ uiduals, lamilies, and communities of many 

Slavery has existed from as_ early time as i families, who live in the most abject condition 

historical records furnish any information of j of poverty and privation in -which life can be 

the social and political condition of mankind, i preserved, (and is not always preserved,) and 

There was no country, in the most ancient prefer such wretched existence to the alterna- 

time of its history, of which the people had live of steady labor, by which thev mie-ht 



made any contiderab'e advances in iitdustiy 
or rerinenieiit, in wliicli ?luvery had not been 
previously and long established, and in general 
use. The reasons fur this universal early ex- 
istence of slavery, and of domestic or indi- 
vidual slavery, (except among the most igno- 
rant and savage tribes,) can be readily deduced 
from the early conditions of society. 

Whether in savage or civilized life, the low- 
er that individuals are degraded by povei'ty 
and want, and tlie fewer aie ilieir nieuus for 
comfort, and the enjoyment of either intellec- 
tual or physical pleasures, or of relief from 
physical suli'erings, the lower do tliey descend 
in their appreciation of actual and even natu- 
ral wants; and the more do they magnify and 
dread tlie efforts and labors necessary to 
protect themselves against the occurrence of 
the privations and sufferings with which tliey 
are threatened. When njan sinks so low as 
not to feel artificial wants, or utterly to dis- 
pair of gralifying any such \>'ants, he becomes 
brutishly careless and indolent, even in pro- 
viding for natural and physical v/ants, upon 
which provision even life is dei>endent. All 
such persons soon learn to regard present and 
continuous labor as an evil greater tiian the 
probable but uncertain future occurrence of 
extreme privation, or even famine, and conse- 
quent death from want Hence the most sav- 
age tribes of tropical regions are content to 
rely for sustenance almost entirely on the nat- 
ural productions of a fertile and bounteous 
soil. The savage inhabitants of less fruitful 



greatly improve tlieii- condition, if not reheve 
all wants for the necessaries of life. Even in 
countries, and among a general population, in 
which the highest rewards are held out for la- 
bor and industry — where some intellectual, 
and also moral and religious instruction, are 
within the reacli of all who will seek and ac- 
cept such benefits, there are numerous cases 
of men who not only forego all intellectual 
and moral improvement for themselves and 
their families, and the attempt to gratify all 
artificial wants, but who also neglect the rehef 
of the most humble comforts and even neces- 
saries of life, rather than resort to that regu- 
lar course of labor which would furnish the 
means for comfortable subsistence. In all such 
cases — whether in civilized or in savage socie- 
ty, or whether in regard to individuals, fami- 
lies in successive generations, or to more ex- 
tended communities — a good and proper reme- 
dy for this evil, if it could be applied, would 
be the enslaving of these reckless, wretched 
drones and cumberers of the earih, and there- 
by' compelling them to habils of labor, and in 
return satisfying their waiits for necessaries, 
and raieing them and their jirogeny in the scale 
of humanity, not only physically, but morally 
and intellectually. Such a measure would be the 
most beneficial in j-oungor rude communities, 
where labor is scarce and dear, and the means 
for subsistence easy to obtain. For even 
among a barbarous people, wliere the aversion 
to labor is universal, those who could not be 
induced to labor with their own hands, and in 



lands, and under more rigorous climates *^le | person, if they became slaveholders, would 
pend on hunting and fishing for a precarious be ready enough to compel the labor of their 



support, and with irregular alternations of 
abundance and lavish waste, with destitution 
and hunger and faaiine. And in every civi- 



slaves, and also would soon learn to economize 
and accumulate the products of their labor. 
Ilence, among any savage people, the Intro- 



duetioa and establishment of domestic slavery 
is necessarily an improvement of the condition 
and wealth and well-being of tlie community 
in general, and also of the comfort of the en- 
slaved class, if it liad consisted of such persons 
as were lowest in the social scale — and is bene- 
ficial in every such case to the master class, 
and to the community in general. 

Indolence of free laborers at high wages — Dif- 
•fercnt incentives to free and tlave labor — 

Comparative values. 

But the disposition to indulge indolence 
(even at great sacrifices of benefit which might 
be secured by industrious labor) is not pecu- 
liar to the lowest and most degi'aded classes of 
civilized communities. It is notorious that, 
whenever ihe demand for labor is nmch great- 
er than the supplj', or the wages of labor are 
much higher than the expenses of living, very 
many, even of tlie ordinary laborimr class, 
are remarkable for indolence, and work no 
more than compelled by necessity. The great- 
er the demand, and the higher the rewards, 
for labor, the less will be ]ierformed. as a gene- 
ral rule, b}^ each individual laborer. If the 
wages of work for one day will support the 
laborer or mechanic and ins family for th^ee, 
it will be very likely that lit; will bo idle two- 
thirds of his time. 

Slave labor, in each individual ease, and for 
each small measure of time, is more slow and 
inefficient than the labor of a free man. The 
latter knows that the more work he performs 
in a short time, the greater will be his rewai-d 
in earnings. Hence, he has every inducement 
to exert himself while at work for himself, 
even though he mav be idle for a longer time af 
terwards. The slave receives the same sup- 
port, in food, clothing, and other allowances, 
whether he works much or little; and hence 
he has every inducement to spare himself as 
much as possible, and to do as little work a» 
he can, without drawing on himself punish- 
ment, which is the only incentive to slave la- 
bor. It is, then, an unquestionable general 
truth, "tliat the labor of a free man, for any 
stated time, is more than the labor of a slave, 
and if at the same cost, would be cheaper to 
the employer. Hence it has been inferred, and 
asserted by all who argue against slavery, and 
is often admitted even by those who would 
defend it^ expeiliencj', that, as a general rule, 
and for whole coirimunities, free labor is cheaji- 
er than slave laboi-. The rule is false, and the 
exceptions only are true. Supjiose it admit- 
ted that the labor of slaves, for each hour or 
day, will amount to but two-thirds of what 
hired free laborei-s would perform in the same 
time. Hut the slave labor is continuous, and 
every day at least it returns to the employers 
and to the community, this two-thirds of full 
labor. Free laborers, if to be hired foi- the 
like duties, would require at least double the 
amount of wages to ])erform one-third more 
labor in each day, and in general, wi)ul(l be 
idle and earning nothing, more length of time 
than that spent in labor. Then, on these prem- 
ises and suppositions, it i.'* manifest that slave 
labor, with its admitted defect in this respect, ( 



will be cheapest and most profitable to the em- 
ployer, and to the whole community, and will 
yield more towards the general increase -of 
production and public wealth ; and that the 
fiee laborer who is idle two days out of three, 
even if receiving double wages for his days 
of labor, is less laborious, and less jiroductive 
for himself, and for the community, and the 
public wealth, than the slave. 

The mistake of those who maintain, or ad- 
mit, this generally asserted proposition, that 
"free labor is cheaper than slave labor," is 
caused by assuming as true, that self-interest 
induces free hirelings to labor continuously 
and regularl}'. This is never the case in gene- 
ral, except where daily and continuous labor 
is required to obtain a bare daily subsistence. 
That case, and its consequences, will be con- 
sidered hereafter. For the present, I will re- 
turn to the causes of slavery. 

War forinerly a source and producer of slavery. 

Though slaverj' would, in the manner above 
stated, have been introduced (if not otherwise) 
among every savage people above the lowest 
and least improvable condition of the savage 
state, still the institution generall}' ])receded, 
and £0 prei'ented, the existence of these condi- 
tions. For there were other still earlier and 
sufficiently operative causes. As soon as men 
outgrew and emerged from strictly patriarchal 
or jjure family government, (the most ancient 
of all.) and were included in larger conmiuni- 
ties, under governments of usurjiation and 
force, it must be supposed that the strong 
ruleii and oppressed the weak, whether acting 
or acted upon as individuals or as communi- 
ties, and in that manner that the weaker 
would become slaves to the sti-onger. If not 
produced otherwise, this would necessarily be 
the result of war between semi-barbarous 
communities; atid war has existed between 
such communities, and has rarely ceasCLl, since 
men were first arrayed in different political 
bodies. Where civilization and rctinement 
were so low as among the most ignorant sava- 
ges of Australia, or most of the North Ameri- 
can Indians, the prisoners of war would be 
put to death, because no profitable use could 
be made of them. But where any advances 
had been made in regular industry, and espe- 
cially where the right of private pioperty in 
land had been establislieJ, the expediency of 
making domestic slaves and laborei's of prison- 
cis of war would soon be acknowleilged and 
acted upon. Thus one of the earliest effects 
of the institution of slavery would be to lessen 
the hoi-rors of war by saving lives that would 
otherwise be sacrificed. 

Slavery imposed as penalty for crime or debt. 
In tlie early conditions of society and of 
j)rivate property, most of the debtoi-s to indi- 
viduals, or to the sovereign, or delinquents 
whose puidshments were pecuniai-y or pro- 
perty amercements, would rarely have any 
other proj)eit3' or means for payment than 
their own ]iersons. Hence would certainly 
follow (as still is the usage in l)arl)ar()ua coun- 
tries) slavery as the payment for debt, and 



penalty for crimes, or offences against the sove- 
reign or the laws. Witli the injustice and 
cruelty usual in all barbarous communities, 
the families of delinquents tluis condemned to 
slaverj' would also be enslaved. And if this 
vrere not ordered by vengieatice and cruelty, 
it would almost surely be re(iuired by expedi 
eucy, and eVen humanity. For the destitute 
wife and young children of a slave, and any 
future and more helpless infants, would gene- 
rally need to be supported, or would perish 
from want. In baibarous communities, regu- 
lar maintenance in sucii cases can only be had 
from a master who can ati'ord to support in- 
fant and then unprofitable slaves, to be com- 
pensated bj' the subsequent labors of their 
mature life and protitable service. Thus, 
slavery would necessarily, and from the begin- 
ning, become hereditary, and be everywhere 
a permanent and fixed condition. 

Where personal slavery is not needed, and if 
previously established would cease to exist. 
By the two modes above stated, slavery 
would necessarily' be established in the early 
state of sociefy of every young and barbarous 
community which was not so savage as to be 
destitute of all regular industry, and of the 
artificial wants which induce a demand for, or 
the desire to possess, the accumulated pro- 
ducts of labor. Without the existence of 
such a demand for the services of slaves as 
will induce and compensate the providing for 
their regular and sufficient support, domestic 
slavery cannot be begun. And if before ex- 
isting, neither can it be continued in old coun- 
tries denselj^ peopled, where the support of a 
slave will be more costl}' than the hire of a 
free man, driven to his greatest exertion by 
extreme want, and depressed by the competi- 
tion of- his fellows to the lowest rate of wages 
at which subsistence is possible. 

Tlie evils and benefits of slavery stated gene- 
rally. 
Slavery, when thus introduced, would be 
frequently attended with circumstances of 
great hardship, injustice, and sometimes atro- 
cious cruelty. Still, the consequences and 
general results were highly beneficial. B}' 
this means only — the compulsion of domestic 
slaves — in the early conditions of society, 
could labor be made to produce wealth. By 
tliis aid only could leisure be afforded to the 
master class to cultivate mental improvement 
and refinement of manners ; and artificial 
wants be created and indulged, which would 
stimulate the desire and produce the effect, to 
accumulate the products of labor, which alone 
constitute private and public wealth. To the 
operation and first results of domestic slavery 
were due the gradual civilization and general 
improvement of manners and of arts among 
all originally barbarous peoples, who, of them- 
eelves, or without being conquered and sub- 
jugated (or enslaved politically) h}' a more en- 
lightened people, have subsequently emerged 
frona barbarism and dark ignorance. The 
slavery supposed to be thus introduced would 
be the subjection of people of the same race 
with their masters — of equals to equals — and 



therefore this would be slavery of the most 
objectionable kind. It would involve most 
injustice and hardship to the enslaved — would 
render it more diftieult for the masters to com- 
mand and enforce obedience — and would make 
the bonds of servitude more galling to the 
slaves, because of their being equal to their 
masters (and, in many individual cases, greatly 
superior,) in natural endowments of mind. 

The greatest works of ancient nations due to 
slavery, and in its v)orst form. 
Still, even this worst and least profitable 
kind of slavery (the subjection of equals, and 
men of the same race with their masters) 
served as the foundation and the essential fii-st 
cause of all the civilization and refinement, 
and improvement of arts and learning, that dis- 
tinguished the oldest nations. Except where 
the special Providence and care of God may 
have interposed to guard a particular family 
and its descendants, there was nothing but the 
existence of slavery to prevent any race or 
society in a state of nature from sinking into 
the rndest barbarism. And no people could 
ever have been raised from that low condition 
without the aid and operation of slavery, 
either by some individuals of the community 
being nuide slaves to otliei-s, or the whole com- 
munity being enslaved, by conquest and sub- 
jugation, in some form, to a foreign and more 
enlightened people. The very ancient and 
wonderful works of construction and sculp- 
ture in Egypt and Hindostan could never 
have been executed, nor even the desire to 
possess them conceived, except where compul- 
sory labor had long been in use, and could be 
applied to such great works. And to the 
same cause was due, not onlj' the later and far 
more perfect and admirable works of art ia 
Greece and Rome, but also the marvellous 
triumphs of intellect among these successive 
masters of the then known world. And not 
only were great works of utility and orna- 
ment so produced, nations enriched and 
strengthened, and empires established and 
maintained, but also there were moral resirlts, 
in private and social life, of far more value. 
In much earlier time, it was on this institution 
of domestic slavery that was erected the ad- 
mirable and benificent mastership and govern- 
ment of the patriarch Abraham, who owned 
so many domestic slaves that he could sud- 
denly call out and lead three hundred and 
eighteen of them, able to bear arms, to repel 
and punish the invasion of foreign hostile 
tribes. The like system of domestic slavery 
then, and for many ages alter, subsisted in 
every part of the world in whicii anj' consid-- 
erable moral or mental progress or economical 
improvement was to be seen. 

Evils of anci<int slavery, and its great extension 
and nbuse^ and relief offered by another kind. 

The institution of slavery in ancient times, 
with its great benefits, had also its great evils, 
and not only in its first establishment, but in 
its latest incidents. The ease and cheapness 
with which slaves could be acquired in the 
latter times of the Roman Empire induced 
their being held in great and unnecessary 



6 



numbers, and no small proportion of them 
were of captive barbarian and warlike ene- 
mies. These conditions were necessary causes 
of Weakness of the master class, and of the 
general comnmnity, and helped to invite tind 
to aid tiie success of the hordes of barbarian 
invaders that swept over the then civilized 
world like a deluge, and, for ages afterwards, 
buried Europe under dark ignorance and bar- 
barian rule. .Still, slow-growing, j'et complete, 
final relief, sprang from the .same cause — 
slavery — that had produced the former civili- 
zation. In one or other form, whether of the 
general and political slaverj- of a people, (as 
of the concpiered to their conquerors,) or of 
class to class, or of serfdom, villenage, or 
elavery to the soil, or of personal .slavery, this 
institution was universal during the dark and 
semi-barbarous middle ages of Europe. And 
in the beginning it was from the slaves made 
of the enlightened and refined, but effeminate 
and cowardly forn>er masters of the lands, 
that the latter civilization first began, and 
■was communicated to their barbarous con- 
querors and their masters. Thus, and con- 
trary t-o the general oi'der of things in this 
case, ti*e enslaved, and not the master class, 
was the source of improvement to the other. 
To this cause it was owing that the revival of 
civilization and learning in Europe oceun-ed 
centuries earlier than would have been the 
case if the slaves, after the complete con- 
quest-s made by barbarians, had been as igno- 
rant as their n>a.sters. 

Tlie extinction of individual slavery the neces- 
sari/ result of an excess of free labor — The 
competition of free laborers, and their great- 
est suferinijx^ produce the greatest projits of 
capital. 

But in every conntr\', when covered by a 
■ dense population, and when subsistence to free 
laborers becomes difficult to be obtained, the 
competition for employment will tend to 
<iepress the price of labor, gradually, to tlie 
lowest rate at which a bare subsistence can 
;be purchased. The indolence natural to man, 
aivd especiall}' in his lowest and most degra- 
ded state, can then no longer be imlulged; 
because to be idle would not be to suffer pri- 
vation otdy, and to incur risks of greater suf- 
fering, but absolutely and speedily to starve 
and die of want. If don7estie slaver}' could 
have continued to exist eo long, the slaves 
then would be in a very much better condi- 
tion fci.an the free laboi-ers, because possessing 
assured means for support, and that, for much 
less \y^.m- and hardship. For sharp want, 
Imnger and cold, are more efFective iiicentiyes 
to labor than the slaveowner's wlirp, even if 
its use k not restrained by an}' feeling of jus- 
tice or mercy. But under sueli conditions of 
free hibor, domestic or individual slavery 
could Moi exist. For whenever want and 
competition shall reduce the wages of free 
labor below the cost of slave labor, Ukii it 
will be more protitable for the slaveowner 
and employer to hii-e free labor (botii cheap- 
ened and ilriven by hunger and inisi-ry) than 
' toiinaintain slaves, and compel their luboi- less 



effectually and at greater expense. Under 
such conditions, slaves (if they could not be 
sold and removed to some other countrj', 
where needed) would be readily emancipated 
by masters to wliom they had become bur- 
densoiiie. Soon, under the operating influ- 
ence of self-interest alone on the master class, 
domes^tic slavery would come to an end of 
itself — give place to the far more stringent 
and oppressive rule of want, as a compeller 
of labor, and be substituted by class-slavery, 
or the absolute subjection of the whole class 
<jf laborers to the wliole class of employers — • 
or of labor to ca))itaL Tli^n, in the progress 
of society, first begins to be true, and soon 
becomes entirely true, the hackneyed propo- 
sition that "free labor is cheaper than slave 
labor;" and it is only true under these cir- 
cumstances, when the supply of labor is regu- 
larly or generally greater than the demand. 
Then the surplus hamls must be left without 
emidoyment, a:.d therefore without means for 
subsJstenee. They can obtain employment 
only by under- bidding the rate of wages then 
received by the laborers employed, and so be 
engaged by throwing- as many other laborers 
out of work. These must, in like manner, 
submit to the same r' luction of wages, to be' 
enabled again to obtain employnjeut by get- 
ting the places 6f as nmny others. Finally, 
all are compelled to work for the leduced wages. 
But, after this general reduction, still, as 
before, the supply of hands will exceed (and 
more and moi-t^ with the increase of popida- 
tion) the demnnd for their labor; as many 
therefore as are surplus must be always out of 
employment, and struggling to obtain it — and 
by the same process, competition, urged by ex- 
treme want, will tend still more to lower wages. 
Thus want and competition will continue to 
compel the superfluous and unemployed hands 
to aubmi't to more and more reduction of 
wages, until the amount generally obtained 
is very much less than what is needed for the 
comfortable subsistence and healthy support 
(jf the laborer. And during all the time of 
this long continued comj)etition o.nd struggle 
for subsistence, while the rate of wages is 
being gradually lowered, the amount of toil 
of each hiborer is increased — or at least as long 
as the hunuvn frame can bear increased exer- 
tion. U7/('u the greatest possible amount of 
labor is thus obtained for the lowest amount of 
wages that can burelij sustain life and strength 
for labor J there has been attained tne most per- 
fect a7id prof /able conditio^n of industrial 
operations for the class of capitalists and em- 
ftlogcra, and alto for the most rapid increase 
of general and national wealth. But these 
benefits (so much lauded and deemed so desi- 
rable for every country, and by almost every 
writer,) are- puichased only by the greatest 
possible amount of toil, privation, and misery 
of the class of laborers under whidi they can 
live and work. It is readily admitted tliat 
slave labor couKl never yield anything like 
such large net returns — and that it would not 
ordy produce ies.s, but would cost more. 
.Slaves could not be subjected to such extreme 
privation and misery, because they must be 



fed and clothed, and cannot generally be 
greatly over-worked, (and never to the profit 
of the master,) as is caused continually by 
the pressure of extreme want, and through 
competition, on free laborers. If the politii;al 
and economical problem to be worked out is 
the produt;tion of the greatest amount of 
profit to capitalists, and of wealth to the 
nation, in a country of dense population and 
advanced industrial operations, without re- 
gard to the sufferings of the laboring class, it 
is cei'tain that the laborers must not be slaves, 
but free from all masters except extreme 
want. England, after the general abolii ion of 
slavery, was more than two centuries ap- 
proaching this condition, which was finally 
reached, aud^hasnow been fully enjoyed foi- 
many years. Since then, England has been, 
of all the countries of tlie world, the most 
prosperous in manufactures, commerce, and 
all industrial emploj'inents of capital and 
labor — and the laboring and poorest classes 
have been among the most destitute and mis- 
erable. That thej' have not been sunk, by 
competition for food, to still greater misery-, 
and that many more numerous and frequent 
deaths have not occurred from absolute starv- 
ation, is owing to the introduction and pro- 
tection of another kind of slavery — pauper 
slavery — which is the certain consequence of 
ferings produced by the competition of fiee 
and the j)artial remedy for, the evils and suf- 
labor. 

Pauper slavery. 

Tliough, after the supply of labor in an}' 
country has long exceeded the demand, com- 
petition for employment will, necessarily, re- 
duce wages to as little as will serve to main- 
tain life under great suffering — yet wages ] 
cannot be reduced any lower, at least to the 
further profit of the whole class of capitalists 
or employers. For, when laborers can no 
longer subsist on their wages, the deficiency 
must in some way be supplied by the property 
owners. In lawless or badly governed coun- 
tries, beggary and theft may be the irregular 
means of drawing that support from property 
•which was denied in wages. In better regu- 
lated communities, the supply is furnished by 
the "poor law," or a compulsory provision for 
the laboring poor who cannot subsist on their 
wages, as well as for the infirm poor, incapa- 
ble of labor. This system is most extensive 
and complete in England, and is the necessary 
result of the competition for einploj'ment of 
free laborers — of England's great and boasted 
euccess in all industrial i)urBuits and profitable 
employment of labor by capital. And thus 
it is, that the cruel oppression by capital, in 
reducing wages to the lowest rate, is avenged 
by the tax levied by and for the poor, equal 
to the deficiency of wages for tlie amount 
necessary for bare subsistence. x\nd to this 
relief, which the poor law promises and affords, 
every day-laborer in England looks forward 
as the almost certain destiny and last resource 
of himself and his family. Tnere are but few of 
that class who do not, at some time, have to 
resort to support by the parish ; and every 



English laborer has more i-eason to expect to 
die a parish-supported pauper, than other- 
wise. 

But this aid held out to pauperism, wretch- 
ed as it is, serves to encourage improvidence, 
and to increase, as much as to relieve extreme 
want. The pauper laborer, supported by the 
compulsory and reluctant charity of his parish, 
is but a little better off than those who perish 
elsewhere for want of such provision. But 
it is not my purpose to consider the system in 
either of these aspects, but in another. The 
pauper, whether laborer or otherwise, receiv- 
ing support from the parish, is neither more 
nor less than a slave to the administrators of 
the law and dispensers of the public charity. 
The pauper ceases to be a free agent in any 
respect. If at work far from the place of iiis 
birth, (in England,) he is remanded and trans- 
ported to his own or native parisii, there to 
obtain support. If either this forced exile 
from his long previous place of residence and 
labor, or other reasons of expediencj* require 
it, husband and wife, and parents and chil- 
dren, are separated, and severally disposed of 
at the will of the overseers of the poor. The 
able-bodied laborer, who at his agricultural 
or other work can earn but six shillings a 
week, and cannot support his family for less 
tlian ten, may, indeed, obtain the deficient four 
shillings from the parish. But to do so, he is 
subject to be forced to take any service that 
the authorities may direct. And as the em- 
ployer receives the pauper laborer against his 
will, and only because he thereby pays so 
much of his share of the poor-tax, he not 
only has the pauper as an involuntary slave, 
but he has not even the indi:cement of self- 
interest to treat the pauper slave well, or to 
care to preserve his health or life. The death 
of the fiauper laborer is no loss to his tem- 
porary employer, and is a clear gain to the 
parish. Hence, while all of the millions of 
pauper population of England are truly slaves, 
and as much under constraint as if each one 
and his family belonged to an individual mas- 
ter, or as negro slaves are here, they have not 
the family comforts, or the care for the pre- 
servation of their health and lives, enjoyed by 
every negro slave in Virginia or Mississippi, 
The negro slaves in the United States have 
increased from 300,000, the number originally 
imported from Africa, to nearly 4,000,000, or 
more than twelve for one. This is a suflicient 
evidence of their general good treatment, in- . 
duced by the self-interest of the owners. If 
it were possible to designate, separately, the 
whole class of poor laborers in England, and.M 
to trace them and their descendants for two ^ 
hundred years, it is most probable that the 
original number would be found diminished 
in as great proportion as that in which our 
negro slaves have increased — or reduced to-'. 
less than one-twelfth part. Yet this wide-- 
spread, miserable, and life-destroying hunger 
slavery and pauper slavery in England is there 
called freedom by the fanatics and sc-called 
philanthropists, who abhor, and call incea-- 
santly for God's vengeance upon, the negro 
slavery of this country I 



8 



Hvils caused to the former serf s and to the com- 
munity, by their emancipation. 
Such are tlie present conditions of things, 
and the relations of labor and capital in Eng- 
land, especially— and also to great extent in j 
France, and the other most populous and rich- 
est countries of the civilized world. When 
these latter conditions (usually understood to 
be evidences of the highest state of national 
prosperity) were first in progress, and were 
extended, j>ersonal slavery rapidly disap])ear- 
ed. It had formerly been general in some 
form in every part of Europe. It now only 
remains as serfdom in the Kussian and Aus- 
trian dominions, and some other of the least 
improved portions of Europe. 

When the slaves or serfs of Europe were 
left free, their masters were relieved from 
what was then comparatively a burden, be- 
> cause they were able to hire cheaper free 
labor. But the former slaves suffered from 
the chanire more than their former masters 
gained. All of them were necessarily thrown 
into the lowest class of free laborers. The 
most industrious and provident among them 
could but enter upon the struggle for employ- 
ment with the most necessitous competitors, 
previously free. The indolent and the reckless 
would either live by depredating on the com- 
munity, as beggars' or thieves, or would per- 
ish from disease or starvation, or other con- 
sequences of want and suffering. And such 
were the eifects. Even as late as 1693, the 
amount of pauperism and beggary, vagrancy, 
thieving, and other petty crimes, and of ex- 
treme misery, was so great among the poorest 
class in Scotland, that Fletcher of Salton, (an 
able statesman, a true patriot, and a stern re- 
publican, and also a strong reasoner, and an 

• elegant scholar,) wrote and published an elabo- 
rate argument, maintaining and urging the 

• expediency of reducing this class of persons 
" to the condition of slavery, not only to relieve 

the communitj-, but for their own benefit, 
and to save them from the extremity of suf- 
fering.* 

■ General and extreme mffcrivg from want im- 
posxible in a slave-'kolding community. 
So long as domestic slavery is general in 
■any country, and for the most part supplies 



• Fletcher's " Tico Dixcourses on the Affain of 
-Scotland. ''' Ttie author therein states, thai there were 
then not less than '2U(i,0U0 persons in Scotland begging; 
their bread from door to door. Th .t was a time ol 
unuMUal distress. Hut. he adds, " yet, in ull lime, there 
have been about 100,000 of these vagabonds who have 
lived witkdut any regard to the lawn of the html, or 
. to those (if (lo'l and ruiture." lie says, further, that 
all the other nations of Europe (except Holland) 
eroaned und'-r a similar pressure. As no such evil 
had been conipliiined of by any of the writers of an- 
tiquity, and as much poverty was the conseiiuence, in 
Europe, of the manumission of slaves, J'Metcher in- 
ferred that tlie existence of slavery was the cause of 
the comfort an<l industry of the lower orders in former 
times. Hence, this "statesman and i.atriol of the 
hiifheet order" proposed the reducing of all these des- 
titute raenilicanla and their posterity to slavery, by a 
Bolemn a<-t of the legislature, (in an<l for Scotland,) us 
the only means by which they could be compelled to 
work and have insured to them the necessaries of lite. 
(See article " Kletcher of Salton," In Edinburgh En- 
cyclopo-dla and (pioiation therefrom, at page 749, vol. 
Ikl, " jf^f uier'B Jiegl8t«r." 



the labor of the country, there is no possibil- 
ity of the occurrence o'f the sufferings of the 
laboring class, such as were described above. 
There, the evils which are caused by extreme 
want and destitution, the competition for sus- 
tenance, class-slavery of labor to capital, and 
lastly pauper slaverj-, are all the incidents and 
necessary results of free society, and "free 
labor." Before such evils can visit any la- 
boring class of personal slaves, they must 
have "first been emancipated, and personal 
slavery abolished. This abolition of slavery 
is indeed like to occur in every country 
in the progress of society, and where the 
increasing population has no sufficient and 
advantageous outlet. But so long as do- 
mestic slavery remains, and is the main 
supply of labor, among any civiMzed people, 
it is a certain indication, and the most unques- 
tionable evidence, that extensive and long 
continued suffering from want or hunger have 
as yet had no existence in that country. The 
first great effect of such distress will be to re- 
duce"(by competition) the wages of free labor 
below the cost of maintaining .4aves---and 
this effect would next cause the extinction of 
slavery, by the mode of sale and exportation, 
or otherwise the emancipation of all the slaves. 
After this step has been made, of course, in 
due time, the want and suffering, which are 
the necessary incidents and consequences of 
free society, are to be expected to follow in 
after times. 

When temporary evils, great loss, and dis- 
tress,' fall ujiou slaveholding countries, it is 
not the laboring class (as in free society) that 
feels the first and heavest infliction, but the 
masters and employers. If a slaveholding 
country is visited by dearth, ravaged by war, 
or by pestilence — or suffers under any other 
causes of wide-spread calamity — every domes- 
tic slave is as much as before assured of his 
customary food and other allowances, and of a 
master's care in sickness and infirmity, even 
though the master class, and the country at 
large, have but half the previously existing 
profits, or value of capital. A striking proof 
of this was afforded by the recent (and still 
continuing) general suspension of payments of 
the banks in this country, and the consequent 
universal pecuniary loss and distress?. Pay- 
ments of debts could not be obtained, com- 
modities could not be sold, and all manufac- 
turing and some otliei great industrial opera- 
tions either had to be continued for greatly re- 
duced prices and wages, or to be entirely sus- 
pended, if of such kind as could be suspended, 
in consequence, in the Northern States, the 
free hired laborers were tlirown out of em- 
ployment, or employed only at much r:educed 
wages. Hence all such j^ersons were greatly 
damaged or distressed, and thousands of the 
most destitute were ready to starve. Hence 
hunger mobs were menacing the city of New 
York with pillage, and the last evils of a 
vicious and unbridled and starving populace, 
excited to insurrection and defiance of legal 
authority. Univeisal loss from this cause also 
visited the slaveholding States, and every 
property bolder, and also, to some exteDt,every 



other free' man therein. But not a slave has 
lost a meal, or a comfort; and as a class, 
the slaves scarcely know of the occurrence 
of this great national calamity which has 
so universally daraaged their masters, and 
the capitalists and employers of laboi*. Nor 
was the difference of effect owing to the slaves 
being generally engaged in agricultural labors. 
The very large business of manufacturing to- 
bacco, in Virginia, is carried on almost exclu- 
sively by the labor of slaves, and those mostly 
hired by the year. The late bank suspension 
serving to suspend all payments of debts to, 
and income of, their great establishments, they 
were generally compelled to suspend work, 
even though still obliged to feed and support 
their hired slave laborers, who, for some time, 
thus received their full allowance and sup- 
port, while remaining perfectly idle, and re- 
turning no compensation whatever to their em- 
ployers who had hired them for the year. 

The " associated labor " doctrine of the social- 
ists true — but deficient in the main agency, 
which slavery only can supply. 

The socialists of Europe, and of the Nortliern 
States of this Union, (there are none existing 
in our Southern States,) of every sect, and 
however differing on other points, have all 
advocated the association of labor, in some 
foi-m or other, as the great means for reforming 
the evils of society arising from starving com- 
petition for labor. The founders and preach- 
ers of socialism had all observed and earnestly 
appreciated these evils. They saw that, in ad- 
vanced society, labor was the slave of capital, 
and that the more capital was enriched by 
the employment of labor, the less was acquir- 
ed and retained by the individual laborers, 
and the more their wants and sufferintjs were 
increased. They also saw, and correctly, that 
there was great loss of time and labor in the 
domestic operations of every poor family, and 
most in the poorest families — and also, that 
the productive labors of all, if associated, and 
thus aiding each other, might be made much 
more pi'bductive. And if by laborers being 
associated in large numbers, and directed by 
their combined knowledge to the most profit- 
able purposes and ends, all uimecessai-y waste 
(as occurs in isolated families) was prevented, 
and all the actual efforts of labor utilized — 
the net profits and economy of such associa- 
ted labor would be much increased, and thus, 
the laborers might secure and retain a suffi- 
cient subsistence, out of the larger share of 
the profits of their labors, which now goes to 
the share of employers and capitalists. Their 
views and doctrines ai'e true in the main, and 
are altogether so plausible, and so applicable 
to the wretched condition of labor in the most 
advanced conditions of society in Europe, tlmt 
the teachers have found lumierous believers 
and zealous disciples. Sundry associations 
have been originated in Europe, and establish- 
ed in America, (as a new country only offered 
the needed facilities,) to carry out, in different 
modes, tlie great object of associating and com- 
bining labor, for the common and general 
profit and benefit. But every such attempt 



has met with signal, and also speedy, failure; 
except a few, of religious associations, which 
were under the guidance aiul direction of a 
single despotic head. In all other cases, no mat- 
ter how benevolent and intelligent the lead- 
ers — and though one hour of labor, in each 
day, in this cheap and fertile country, would 
yield more food than fifteen hours' labor in 
Eui'ope — still these associations soon failed in 
their ever}' aim and purpose, and were several- 
ly broken up as soon as their inherent defects 
were made manifest, and seen to be inevita- 
ble and incurable incidents of the system. 

Yet, so far as their facts and reasoning go, and 
in their main doctrines, the socialists are right. 
Associated labor can be much more produc- 
tive, and be conducted more economically, 
than the labors of individual persons or fami- 
lies. The socialist theorists reasoned correctly, 
and in their practical experiments they devised 
good but defective plans. They constructed 
admirable and complex machinery to produce 
certain final results, in which every wheel 
and other operating agent was well adjusted as 
a secondary cause, or effect of another preced- 
ing cause. But in all these great and com- 
plicated works, the ai-tiiicers liad omitted to 
supply the first and great motive power, which 
is to be found only in one directing mind, and 
one controlling will. Supply the one supreme 
head and governing power to the association 
of labor, (for the suitable conditions of socie- 
ty,) and the scheme and its operation will be- 
come as perfect as can be expected of any 
human institution. But in supf)l3-ing this sin- 
gle ruling jiower, the association is thereby con- 
verted to the condition of domestic slavery. 
And our system of domestic slavery offers in 
use, and to the greatest profit for all parties 
in the association, the realization of all that is 
sound and valuable in the socialists' theories 
and doctrines, and supplies the great and 
fatal defect of all their plans for practically 
associating labor. A few illustrative views 
will be submitted, which will apply to both 
the theoretical free associated labor, and to 
the practical domestic slave labor. 

Suppose that some extensive industrial ope- 
ration, as the tillage of a great farm, the work- 
ing of a mine, or a cotton fac( ory, is carried 
on b}'' the labor of fifty men, with that of such 
other few members of their fnnulies as can be 
spared from home. These men, as usual, gene- 
rally, are mari'ied, and have one or more 
young children. But whether single and 
without ('hildrcn, or husbands, or widowers 
with children, every man is the head of an 
isolated family, for which separate services are 
indispensable. Each home or family requires, 
and has, its separate purchasing of food, (and 
at retail and highest prices,) its separate cook- 
ing, washing, fires, lights, nursing of children, 
and of the sick, &c., ttc. Such duties, in an 
ordinary or average family, fully occupy the 
time of the wife and mother. If there is no 
wife, or the mother is dead, the single man, or 
the father, is more or less required to perform 
the like household and woman's duties. Thus, of 
the supposed fifty households, probably includ- 
ing not less than from 150 to 200 persons, there 



10 



may be but the fifty men to labor for -wages. 
AH tlie many others capable of labor, are tuUy 
employed as menial servants and nnrses tor 
their Respective families. This is necessarily 
the condition of free laborers, each working 
for himself and his family. 

Now sunpo^^e, instead of this free popula- 
tion that all the laborers and their lamilios 
Tvere slaves to the employer. Then, with pro- 
per and convenient arrangement of buildings, 
Ifec. instead of there being fifty women cook- 
inff washing, and nursing the siek or the lieli'- 
-less of so many different small hous-jhoMs, 
four or five migll.t even better (with the better 
means and facilities atfoided by the master) - 
perform these services for all. This would dis- j 
pense with some forty-five women, or other 
hands fit for labor, previously engaged 1:1 these 
household duties, and which would nearly 
double the number previously woikiug lor 
productioti and profit. This great increase of 
iiumbers would fully compensate for t.ic gene- 
ral lessening of each individual's labor, wuich 
is certain of domestic slaves compared to liee 
laborers driven bv hunger. Tliis abatement 
of toil, together with the allowances indispen- 
sable to the profitable existence of slavery, 
would render certain the comfortable subsist- 
ence of the slaves, which, if it could have been 
for free laborers, would ultimately have given 
way to the sutferiugs from competiiioa and 
slavery, to want, and next to the pauper 
slavery now so general in England. Further 
in this^ form of associated labor, there would 
be secured many of the savings 111 expenses 
■which the socialists correctly counted upon, 
besides those already mentioned. By the sin- 
gle head andmaster'providingall the necessa- 
ries for the maintenance and comfort of the 
laboring class, the contracts and purchases 
would be few and on a large scale, and at 
wholesale prices. There would not, at any 
time, be a deficiency of food, nor any necessa- 
ry deficiency of medical or nursing attendance 
on the sick. AVhen reciuired by ecunomv, hre 
and light could be sup]. lied to all at ha t the 
cost tlKit would be required separatel}^ lor 
each family. Thus, in the institution of do- 
mestic slavery,, and in that only, are most 
completely realized the dreams and sanguine 
hopes of Uie socialist school of philanthfopists. 
Yet the socialists arc all arrayed among the 
most fanatical and intolerant denouncers ol 
domestic slavery, and the most malignant ene- 
mies of slaveholders. 



Tlie hajinning of ner/ro slavery in America, 
and its effects. 

Ab slavery or serfdom (for the causes above 
stated) was ceasing to exist in England, an- 
other kind of slavery was beginning to be es- 
tablished in the new seltlemeiits in America. 
This was the slavery of African negroes to 
European masters— of one among the most in- 
ferior to the most sujierior race of mankind. 
The condition <.f yoiinu colonies, where lan.l 
was at th.' lowest" lU'ice, labor at the highest, 
fl„d the demand for labor exceeding any pos- 
eiblo supply, made slavery there especially 



profitable. And as it was agricultural labor 
that was required, and at first for the rudest 
processes, slaves as ignorant and savage as the 
native Africans would serve the purpose. 
Hence arose, and was extended, the African 
slave-trade. It was first begun, by the Por- 
tuguese, in the latter part of the fifteenth cen- 
tury. But the regular African slave-trade, 
and the extensive use and employment of Af- 
rican slaves in America, occurred m the six- 
teenth century— the same remarkable epoch 
when the European mind, and European en- 
terprise, received their greatest impulse, and 
made the greatest improvements — when the 
art of printinsr was discovered, the Protestant 
1 religion was established, the modern route to 
IndTa and the rich East was found, and when 
I America was discovered, and a new hemis- 
j phere, almost unfilled previousl}', was, for the 
first time, ready to receive settlement and cul- 
ture from the white race, directing the labor 
of black slaves. When the Caucasian mind 
thus commands and directs the bodily powers 
of the ignorant negro, it is the best possible 
form of slavery, and the condition which con- 
duces most to^he benefit of both the white 
and the black race— and especially is best for 
the happiness and improvement of the latter. 
Indeed, it is the only condition in which the 
negro race has received much enlightenment, 
or civilization, or real Christianity, in the 
thousands of years during which African bar- 
barism has been known to exist. 

Having designed to confine my remarks 
to the politico economical or utilitarian view 
of neero slaverv, other questions have not 
even been touched, which some readers would 
deem much the most important, to wit: the 
Bilile authority for, and the religious and 
Christian influence and operation ol slavery. 
Thes* branches of the general .subject have 
been fullv discussed by earlier writers, far bet- 
ter qualified than myself to treat them. But 
1 there is one remarkable statistical fact, winch, 
• though it is the most important in its religious 
i bearing, is also connected with my special piar- 
pose. The following jtassage. copied from the 
recent work of the Rev. J. C. Stiles, goes to 
show that neuro slavery in the Southern 
States has made twice as many Christians as 
all other missionaiy efforts liavc efiected 
among heathens, throughout the world: _ _ 
"In 1855, heathen ohurch-membership is 
set down at 180,000. The present estiniate of 
colored church mendiers in the Melhodist 
Church South alone, [which includes slave- 
holdiiu' States only, and does nol include Mary- 
h,nd and a part of Virginia,! isn5,(>00. Eight 
„r ten years as^'o, the Baptist colored member- 
shii> at' the So^iith was recorded as only 4,000 
"less than the Methodist. When to these two 
.mmbers, you add all the colored luembers of 
other unincluded orgaiiizalions of Methodists 
and BaT)1ists, also of P.piscopahans, Lutherans, 
,ind Presbyterians, Old School, New School, 
and Cumberland, you rea<lily reach an aggre- 
igate of colored church m.inbership luartmce 
(IK larqe as the striethj heathai orthodox church 
Iwemh'ership of the world." --Modern iicform 
\ Examined— Appendix, p. 271. 



11 



The great extent of slavery in Africa, and the 
change therefrom to slavery in America. 
The social aad political state of the negvo 
race in Africa lias always been the same. The 
darkest ignorance, with savage ferocity and 
crueltj', have been universal. The wliole pop- 
ulation was divided into different and usually 
hostile tribes, eacli governed by an ignorant, 
savage, and bloody despot, having unlimited 
autliority. Personal slavery was everywhere 
so extended that inuch the greater number of 
the people were slaves to individual masters; 
and their slavery was the most galling and in- 
tolerable, because of the savage ignorance of 
the masters, and thoir C(nisequent recklessness 
of the happiness or the lives of those in their 
power. The exchange of physical conditions, 
from being a slave in Africa, in savage society 
and to a savage master, an.l under the general 
form and conduct of unlimited despotic gov- 
ernment, there universal, to the general or 
usual condition of slaves in these Southern 
States, would be even more conducive to the 
benefit of the slaves than of their new mas- 
ters. And even with all th« evils, injustice, 
sufferings, and cruelties which acconipauieil 
the transporting of slaves from Africa to Amer- 
ica, (while the traffic was legal and uninter- 
rupted,) the cliange still was probably benefi- 
cial to most of the transported slaves, and cer- 
tainly to tlieir descendants in all subsequent 
time. The slaves so obtained were generally 
such as had been slaves in Afi-iea, or recent 
captives in war, whom enslavement saved 
from being killed. If auj- previously free 
were included, it was because the tenure of 
freedom was of little value, and every man's 
freedom, as well as his life, was at the dispo- 
sal, either by caprice or ciuelty, of the despot 
of the tribe. It was manifestly icf the inte- 
rest of tiie slave-traders to bring their cargoes 
in the best condition to the market in Amei'i- 
ca. Thei-efore, self-interest prompted them to 
take the best care of the health, and lives, and 
consequently of the comfort, of the slaves 
when on their passage across the ocean. Con- 
sidering the diflerence of the previous respec 
tivfc conditions, it is probalde tliat all the evils 
and ph\'sical sufferings of the Africans, when 
thus transported to America, were not greater 
to their brutish feelings than are the different 
evils, both moral and phj^sical, suffered by the 
lower class of free and voluntary I'^uropean 
emigrants, who are now continually brought, 
in ship loads, to America. There are, indeed, 
abundant causes for wrongs and sufferings 
from injustice and cruelty, previous to and du- 
ring the transportation, in Iiotli these cases, as 
in every otiier state of complete subjection of 
any human beings to others. There were, doubt- 
less, numerous cases of great injustice and hor- 
rible cruelty in the early slave-trade, as there 
are now in many partieulur and exceptional 
cases of the existing negro siiivery in these 
Southern States. Many such abuses in the 
slave-trade might have been, and ought to 
have been, prevented by proper legal regula- 
tions. But the existence of sucli evils, both 
in the former and present condition of negro 



slaves, is no ground for condemning and de- 
nouncing the institution of slavery, more thaa 
any other wide spread and generally benefi- 
cial institution, because of its accompanying 
evils, and even if such evils are inevitable. 

Former and more recent opinions as to the 
morality or immorality of slavery. 

It is interesting and curious to observe the 
different and shifting liglits in whicli slavery 
and tlie slave-trade have been viewed at dif- 
ferent times. From all historical and cotempo- 
raneons testimony, it may be inferi'ed tliat, un- 
til in modern times, slavery in itself was never 
deemed by any to be a violation of morality, 
or as contrary to humanitj', or as ground for 
offence to the conscience or sensibility of the 
most virtuous and religious persons. In. 
Greece, and afterwards in tiie Roman Empire, 
neither among masters nor slaves, did the in- 
stitution of slaverj', or the ordinary condition 
and the obligation.? of slaves, seem to be ever 
considered as unjust Cr oppressive, more than 
the difference of conditions of property and 
ratdc, of luxurious indulgence and abject want 
and misery, and the extremitj- of human suf- 
fering, .such as now exist everyv.'here, and are 
especially to be noticed in free and rich Eng- 
land. Indeed, tliere are now hundreds who, 
entertaining socialist or agrarian opinions, 
denounce and contend against what they 
deem the wrong and iniquity of the unequal 
distribution of property, and would be ready 
to maintain their doctrines by force and blood- 
shed, where, in ancient times, there was one 
moral reasoner, or even one slave, who held 
the modern doctrine of slaverj^ being essen- 
tially wrong ami sinful, and a grievous and 
imjust oppression of the slave bj^ the master. 
The philosopher Epictetus was a slave, and 
was undoubtedly and immeasurably superior 
to his master in learning and moral worth. 
Yet, he did not complain, either of his own 
position, or of the injustice and wrong of 
slavery in general. The great moral writer 
and moralist, Samuel Johnson, when, with all 
his intellectual labors, he could scarcely earn 
a bare and wretched subsistence, would have 
been as like to comjilain that, he was not raised 
as much higher in foi-tune and rank, as he was 
truly superior in intellect and worth, to most 
of the actual possessors of either in England. 
From before the days of Abraham to within the 
nineteenth century, the mere fact of a man's be- 
ing a slave was no more deemed wrongful than 
the other general fact that all the jiolitical 
power and wealtli of a country should l)e held 
i)y a few persons, (and those not the most wise 
or virtuous,) without regard to the consent or 
o])inions of others; and that a much greater 
number of their countr^'men should be with- 
out any ]>olitieal power even for defence, and 
without dailj' bread, or means for subsistence. 
These differences in England, the most free 
country in the Old World, are greater, and 
more important tlian the difference between 
the necessary conditions of master and slave. 

Tiie propriety of placing these cases in com- 
parison will be <lenied on tlie ground that the 
free man, however low, is not debarred by 



12 



law, as the slave is, from rising above his first 
condition. It is, indeed, tlieoretically and 
physically possible that the child of a day 
laborer, or a pauper, in England, niay rise to 
the highest political distinctions that are not 
hereditary-. But, in practice, such elevation 
would be more improbable than a slave, in 
other countries, rising to wealth and high pub- 
lie honors. Where difference of race did not 
(as it does of African slaves) forbid, there have 
been many more cases of slaves and the sons 
of slaves, becoming leaders of armies and rulers 
of kingdom^ than there have beeti of the sons 
of free English laborers oi* peasants rising to 
high rank and wealth. Wiien Diocletian i-ose 
from the condition of a slave to be Empei-cr 
of the Roman world, he did not encounter and 
overcomesucli great obstacles to his ascending 
progress as Avould the free laborer of the 
greatest natural talent in England, to become 
Prime Minister of the kingdom, or Command- 
«rin-chief of its armies. 

Origin and progress of the African slave- 
trade — Changes of public opimoji thereupon. 

Considerations of morality and religion, or 
of benevolence, liad no bearing whatever on 
the beginning or the progress of the extinction 
of slaver}', or villenage, in England, and else- 
where in Europe. It was simply a question 
of gain or loss to the previous masters. And, 
as conscientious or leligious scruples had no 
influence to encourage or promote this move- 
ment of emancipation in Europe, neither did 
such scruples exist, or have the least operation 
in restraining the beginning and early progress 
of the African slave-trade, for tlie supply of 
America. Las Casas, one of the most benevo- 
lent of men, a sincere and devout christian, 
and a philanthropist as earnest and zealous as 
Wilberfui'ce or Clarkson, was the first to pro- 
pose (to tlie Emperor Charles V.,) the bring- 
ing of African slaves to South America, by 
means of the slave-trade, Ijiat, by their sub- 
stituted bondage and labor, might be saved 
the feebler race of native Americans, who were 
fast dying out and disappearing under the 
Bevere slavery and labor to which they liad 
been subjected by the Spanish colouists. This 
bondage was destructive to the American 
slaves, and yet of little profit to their masters. 
Just the reverse of both these conditions were 
found in regard to the more docile, patient, 
strong, and enduring Africans. 

The distinguished navigator Hawkins was 
tlie earliest J^nglish slave-trader. For this and 
other naval and patriotic services, (iueen 
Elizabctli biatiiwed on him the then high dig- 
nity and reward of knighthood; and further, 
she purchased an investment, and ludd a share 
in Sir John Hawkins' continued slave-trading 
business. I'.ngland became the great slave- 
tradei-, exceeding in the number of negroes 
annually transported to, and sold in America, 
the vessels of all the world besides. The busi- 
ness was deemed of great commei'cial and 
national value, was encouraged by the laws, 
wa.s recommended by the public declarations 
of several English monarchs, (one of them 
"William 111.,) and certainly was discounte- 1 



nanced by none. The extensive smuggling of 
African slaves bj^- English ships into Spanish 
America, in contravention of the laws and ex- 
clusive commercial policy of Spain, (which did 
not oppose the colonies receiving slaves, but 
only the trading with any other nation than 
Spain,) was the cause of war between the two 
countries; and by the treaty of peace (of 
Utrecht) which closed that vrar, England re- 
quired and obtained from Spain the formal grant 
of the right to bring and sell a certain large num- 
ber of African slaves annually to the Spanish 
colonies. Now, what Queen Elizabeth did, and 
other English Monarchs recommended, or what 
any English administration sustained and pro- 
moted, would be far from indicating that such 
acts were- virtuous, or even otherwise than in- 
iquitous. But such open advocating, sustaining, 
and participating in the slave-trade, and the 
almost monopolizing it by the English people 
when it was most extended, and this course 
being continued far into the reign of George 
III., will suffice to prove that the slave-trade, 
so approved bj' Monarehs, Parliament, and 
people, for centuries, and opposed by not even 
a single voice, could not have been deemed 
contrary either to morality or religion. Even 
within the last seventy years, and alter some 
of the founders of the opposite doctrines had 
begun to speak, the general opinion of the 
most moral and religious members of English 
society had not begun to condemn slavery in 
the abstract, or even the actual cruelties of 
the Afiican slave-tiade. A sufficient proof of 
this assertion is presented in the circumstances 
of the life of the He v. John Kewton. In the 
earlier portion, and through the prime of his 
life,, he had been regtdarlj' engaged in the 
African slave-trade. He had continued in this 
business as captain of a slave-ship, and when 
he was free to choose any jireferable trade ; 
and moreover, he so continued to be a regular 
slave-trader long after he had become a pious, 
devoted, and exem})lary christian. His sin- 
cerity and his piet}' have not been doubted 
by any of those who have since denounced the 
iniquity of slavery in general, and more es- 
peciallj', of tlie African slave-trade. It is true, 
that the Rev. John Newton, late in life, and 
when a distinguished and venerated ]ireacher 
of the Gospel, allied himself to the then new 
and growing anti-slave-trade and slavery 
party of Clarkson and Wilberforce. But this 
later position of his, in no degree, contradicts 
what I have inferi'cd from his earlier and long 
continued business as a slave-trader, and when 
he was no less moral, conscientious, and chris- 
tian, ihan iu his later and more distinguished 
ecclesiastical position. 

Beginning and progress of the anti-slavery 
doctrine and sect In the American Revo- 
lution. 

Virginia and South Carolina, and perhaps 
other of the then colonies of England, had 
earnestl}' opposed the further introduction of 
African slaves. But their wishes were disre- 
garded, and their legislative enactments for 
this purpose were annulled l)y the mother 
country, that her profits from the elave-trade 



13 



might not be lessened. These facts stand 
forth among the grievances stated in both the 
Declarations of Indepeiideuce, first of Vir- 
ginia, and of the United States. At that time, 
and earlier, the prohibiti(jn of the further 
supply of slaves from Africa was propec, even 
upon grounds of economy and expediency. 
At an earlier time, the slaves in Virginia had 
exceeded the whites in number in the pro- 
portion of ten to seven. In Soutli. Carolina, 
the slaves had been thrice as numerous as tlie 
white ])onulation. — (Dew's Essay on Slavery.) 
In addition, the i hen settled territory' of tiie 
colonies was all east of the Alleghany moun- 
tains, and there appeared not even a chaiice 
for expansion beyond tlie Mississij:)pi. Under 
these circumstances, sound discretion and pol- 
icy required tlie cessation of any further 
supply of African slaves. But the most cor- 
rect oi)inious in regard to national policy, 
■when contested by an opposing and hostile 
party or nation, are apt to run into excess 
and extremes. Hence, when tlie further in- 
troduction of slaves into this country was 
properly deemed an evil, and a grievance 
inflicted by England merelj' for her greater 
profit in the slave-trade, to aid the just oppo- 
sition to and denunciation of this oppression, 
every supposed evil of slavery was cited, and 
exaggerated. This disposition, in conjunction 
with the tlien first springing and fast growing 
theontical doctrines of the equal, natural, and 
political rights of man, which were conceived 
and nourished in the conflict of opinions 
caused by the American Revolution, (and 
which doctrines admitted of no exceptions to 
their general application,) gave existence to the 
anti-slavery doctrines and sect, which after- 
wards became so greatly extended, and have 
had such great influence in 1 oth hemispheres. 
But while Jefferson and manj'^ (if not all) 
others of the Republican leaders and assertors 
of American liberty, thus acquired and erro- 
neously maintained the opinion of the evil and 
criminality of African slavery, and hoped for 
its future extinction in this country, none of 
them would have advocated, or submitted to, 
the end since and now sought by tiie modern 
disciples of this doctrine, in the immediate 
and s[)eedy abolition of the obligations of 
slavery. 

Progress of anti-slavery doctrine and fanat- 
icism in Englaiid, France, and the United 
States. 

The new anti-slaverj- doctrines soon spread 
in England, and far more extensively. For 
there, the enthusiasts and fanatics had no 
practical knowledge of African slavery, and 
addressed their arguments to a people still 
more ignorant of the whole subject, and who 
had nothing to lose, or to suffer, from the 
most complete carrying into practical opera- 
tion of these new theoretical views. Still 
more rapidly, completelj', and disastrously, 
did these views of natural equality of races, 
and of negro emancipation, spread in France — 
they being exactly suited to the then revolu- 
tionary madness of that country. The gen- 
eral opinions and political dogmas prevailing 



in France, at that time, which were called 
republican, and falsely deemed promotive of 
the liberty and well-being of mankind, carried 
with them, as a corollary, the doctrine that 
negro slavery was not only a great national 
evil, but a crime; and tlie most moderate and 
conservative reasoners, and even in these 
Soutliern States, genei'aily admitted that negro 
slavery was a threat evil and injustice, which 
it was desirable should be extinguished as 
soon as it could be done beneficially for the 
slaves, and safel}- for the masters. As late aa 
1830, this speculative anti-slaverj' opinion 
was almost universal iu Virginia. Not a 
voice was then heard to vindicate or approve 
the institution, or even to defend its existence 
and continuance, except on the grounds of 
necessity — a necessity caused by the political 
inability of the colonies formerly to prevent 
slaves being introduced by the mother coun- 
try, and subsequently the manifest danger and 
general destruction that would follow imme- 
diate emancipation. While the slaveholders 
held strongly to their legal lights of property, 
and would have resisted to death any foreign 
interference therewith, there was scarcely one 
of them, of cultivated mind and feelings, who 
did not deem negro slavery an evil, public 
and private, political, moral, and economical, 
and who would not have rejoiced to have in 
prosjject its future and safe extinction. But 
this moderate condemnation was not enough 
for the fanatical abolition faction of the 
Northern States, which Avas then beginning 
to exhibit its malignity and strength, and 
which has ever since been increasing in num- 
bers and violence. These Northern opposers 
of slavei'3', having nothing to lose personally, 
or at home, have been preaching the natural 
equality of rights of the negro race; and 
urging the speediest and most effectual con- 
summation of their doctrines of universal 
emancipation and liberty, without the least 
regard to the evils that would follow. These 
sentiments have been fast growing and extend- 
ing in the Northern States and in Europe, and 
are still extending among the more ignorant 
and greater number iu all countries in which 
personal slavery has no existence. But the 
violence of the attacks and denunciations of 
this fanatical school has driven slaveholders 
to examine their own jiosition, and especially 
to investigate, in proper manner, the question 
of slavery in all its aspects and bearings. 
Such examination and investigation, by strict 
reasoning, had never been before applied to 
this question. And the result has been that 
nearly all thinking and reasoning men now as 
fully believe negro slavery to be a great ben- 
efit for this country, as they formerly be- 
lieved it to be a great evil. And not only 
has this change been produced in these'slave- 
holding states, where self-interest would serve 
to quicken and fortify perception of this truth, 
but also in the Northern States and in Eng- 
land there is a great and decided reaction in 
this respect, and change of opinion with many 
enlightened and the least prejudiced minds. 
And not only have many men been thus 
, brought to acknowledge the highly beneficial 



14 



effects of negro slavery, but also to advocate 
the African slave-trade, under legal permission 
and proper regulations and restrictions. 

Legidation of the United States and England 
to suppress the African slave-trade, and the 
conseqiietices. 

As soon as the former colonies had become 
free from tlie rule of England, Virginia and 
most of the others prohibited, and entirely 
prevented theneeforwai-d, the importation of 
slaves from Africa or any other fojeign coun- 
try. At a later time, aiid after a long strug- 
gle, the English Parliament enacted the sup- 
pression of the slave-trade from and after 
1807. Since, the Govei-nments of both the 
United States and England have treated the 
slave-trade as ]iiracy, and have used every 
etl'ort to prevent its being jirosccuted by the 
people or ships of the respective countries. In 
this legal policy of suppression, France and 
Other important powers have concurred, and 
all others agreed in sentiment, and in denun- 
ciation of the slave-trade, except Spain and 
Portugal, which powers continued to receive 
African slaves into their then colonies Cuba 
and Brazil. Finally, Bra7.ii has also forbid- 
den the further importation; and to Cuba 
alone, and against the laws and treaties of 
Spain, is the African slave-trade still carried 
on. Yet, with all th« stringent and general 
measures used for the snppress^ion of the trade, 
and with Britisli and American vessels of war 
continually cruii^ing about and watching the 
places for embarking slaves in Africa, tlie at- 
tempted suppression of the slave-trade has 
scarcely had any effect in diminishing the 
number of negroes taken from Africa, while 
the cruelty and sufferings of the ocean trans- 
portation (or of the "middle passage") have 
been made ten-fold more atrocious and life- 
destroying, than they were in the previous 
legal and open trade. Formerl}-, the ownei-s 
and masters of slave-shijjs were, at least, un- 
impeded iti the use of every means of care for 
their captive slaves that ])ecuniary or selfish 
interest Avould dictate. It was not only the 
most humane, but the most ju-ofitable proce- 
dure, to protect the health and the lives of the 
captives, by allowing them good food, enough 
space, and fresh air. But, since the prohibi- 
tion, and the heavy penalties, and great risks 
of capture, the slave-vessels are constructed 
entirely for swift sailing, to avoid being cap- 
tured — and, because of the small sizes and 
low decks of the v-essels, the slaves are kept 
in the most hori-ible condition of confinement 
and suffering that M'ouhl not be certainly des- 
tructive of lil'.j, so as best to insure the escai>e 
and safe voyage of the vessel, thongli it should 
be with but one-half of the slaves left alive. 
For Bo mucli had increased the demand and 
prices of slaves, that if no more than half of 
a cargo of slaves perislied on the middle j)as- 
sagi-, the other half would return enormous 
pi-ofit<i on the whole shipment and expense of 
the voyage. In reference to these well-estab- 
li«hed facts, the so-called "sujjpression of tlie 
African elave-ti-ade," by P^ugland, has been 
deuounccd by inuay oi the ablest and most; 



zealous of the anti-slavery sect, as an entire 
failure of the object, even in lessening the 
number of slaves exported from Africa, and 
as serving to increase the amount of the cruel- 
ties and sufferings which accompanied the 
former legal trade. 

Height of fanatical opposition to slavery, and 
r''C>nt .reaction and approval of the institu- 
tion. 

But the attempted siippression of the slave- 
tiade was denounced only for its ineffieiencj\ 
Everj- opinion that was uttered in regard to 
the suppi'ession was strongly approbatory of 
the object, and in favor of its being rendered 
truly and fully operative. Looking to the 
cruelties and destruction of life, caused by the 
then existing and illegal slave-trade, it was. 
regarded with detestation and horror, even 
by the few persons who had so early learned 
to approve of the practical operation and re- 
sults of negro slavery of long previous origin, 
and to deem the institution highly beneficial 
to all parties. The change of opinion on this 
subject was recent. As late as 18.30, in the 
slaveholding States, there were to be found no 
defenders or approvers of slavery, but only 
apologists for the compulsory participation 
therein of themselves and their countrymen. 
The existence of slavery was still deemed a 
great and unavoidable evil, at first inflicted 
b}' the unscrupulous avarice of the mother 
and ruling country — and it was hoped by all 
that the condition was but temporary, and 
that, finally, slaveiy would be removed from 
our country and peo]ile. 

Professor Dew, of Virginia, was the first, 
in his "Essay on Slavery," to defend and jus- 
tify the institution, and, as boldly as ably, to 
maintain its utility, and the folly and mad- 
ness of carrying out, iij any Avay, the eman- 
cipation doctrines and schemes of abolitionists, 
whether they were the northern and practi- 
cal, or the southerji and theoretical or specu- 
lative views. Xever has anj- work, of mere 
reasoning on previously known facts, had such 
great effect. It seemed as if men in modern 
times had not before dared to think on this 
subject. Soon the benificent operation of 
slavery in general, (wherever applicable and 
needed,) and, especially, of negro slavery in 
these Southci'u States, was acknowledged by 
many — and since, it has been, and now is, uni- 
versally recognized and maintained, wherever 
negro slavery exists — and also by many of 
the thinking inen in countries where anti- 
slavery fanaticism is most prevalent and in- 
tolerant. At this day there are more men in 
the Southern States, and even in Virginia, who 
would now approve of reopening the legal 
African slave-trade, (to sujiply the present 
great need and demand for laboi',) than could 
have been found twenty-five years ago, who 
did not then believe that negro slaverj- waa 
ail enormous evil and injury, in every aspect, 
and to every interest concerned. And the 
belief of the beneficial operation of African 
slaveiy, for countries to which it is best suited, 
is now everywhere extending among the com- 
paratively lew men of intelligcuce, as much 



15 



as the fanatical opposition to slavery is also 
growing and extending among the more nu- 
merous body of the ignorant and deluded, or 
unthinking and prejudiced of the people of 
the jSTorthern States.* 

The dogma of the natural mental equality of 
the black and white races considered. 

"When the anti-slavery doctrines were first 
taught, and for many years after, one of the 
main positions of the advocates was, the as- 
sumption of the natural equality and capacity 
for mental improvement of the black and 
white races, or the negro and Caucasian. This 
bold assumption of the one party was either 
tacitly admitted, or but rarely and faintly de- 
nied, by the other. It was then generally 
supposed that, with full opportunity and fa- 
cilities, and sufficient time for improvement, 
the negro could be raised to be equal to the 
white man in mental acquirements — or, at 
least, to tlie capacity for self-government, and i 
self-support and preservation. There had [ 
then been no sufficiently long and full practi- 1 
cal trial or experiment of this doctrine. Since, ' 
there have been ample trials in practice which 
have served so fully to prove the contrary, 
that no unprejudiced mind can now admit the 
equality of intellect of the two races, or even 
the capacity of the black race either to be- 
come or remain industrious, civilized, when in 
a state of freedom and under self-govern- 
ment — or, indeed, in any other condition than 
when held enslaved and directed by white 
men. A few genei-al statements and com- 
ments thereon will be here presented, on each 
of the several great and long continued ex- 
periments of freedom conferred on negroes, 
either as individuals, or in societies and com- 
munities, independent of the white race. 



* Professor Dew's Essay, the earliest modern vindi- 
cation and defince of slavery, has obtained for its au- 
thor the highest award of merit, not only for its pri- 
ority, and thus exhibiting original thought and reason- 
ing, but also because this earliest argument, taken as a 
whole, is among the best of all the able recent writings 
on the same side. For, since tliat l)eginning, many and 
able publications have appeared, in which slavery has 
been examined and defended ou every different 
ground — as in regard to morality and religion, and 
to Christianity — and as to its political, soc-ial, and 
economical intluences and bearings. In some particu- 
lar branch of the general subject, each of several dif- 
ferent late writers has excelled all his predecessors. 
But no one, yet, has so well covered the whale ground 
of investigation, exposition, and argument, as Profes- 
sor Dew. The next in order of time, and of merit, and 
for its extensive scope, is a small volume which was 
published in Philadelphia, in 1S36. It appeared with- 
out the author's name, though it offers internal evi- 
dence that he was a Nortliern man. This worlc, which 
is entitled " The South Vindicated from the Treason 
and Fanaticism of the Northern .\bolitionists," well 
deserves republication, and the attentive perusal of all 
who desire lo be well informed on the general subject. 
Of other, and able, and conclusive arguments, but di- 
rected to particular branches only of the general ques- 
tion, the letters of Gov. J. II. Hammond, of South 
Carolina, to Clarkson, and the "Scriptural and Statis- 
tical views of Slavery," by the Itev.T. Stringfellow, 
for their particular and limited objects and popular 
manner, deserve especial commendation. The "So- 
ciology," and other recent publications of George Fitz- 
hugh, E«q., are worthy of high commend.ation for 
novel and profound views on the comparison of slavery, 
with what is miscalled, "free" society. 



The intellectual inferiority of the black race, 
tested by facts, in the United States, 

Hundreds of thousands of individual cases 
of emancipated negro slaves, and their de- 
scendants, have existed in this country in the 
last two centuries. Ihis class has now in- 
creased, in Virginia alone, to more than 
50,000 in number. In the non-slaveholding 
States, also, there are numerous free negroes. 
It is true, that when thus interspersed among 
the much more numerous and dominant class 
of wliite inhabitants, the free negroes are sub- 
jected to some depressing and injurious in- 
iluences, from which they would be relieved 
if forming a separate community. But, on 
the other hand, they have derived more than 
compensating benefits from their position, in 
the protection of government to person and 
propertv, and the security of both, and exemp- 
tion from the evils of war, and from great op- 
pression by any stronger power. Yet^ in all 
this long time, and among such great num- 
bers of free negroes, everywhere protected in 
person and property, and in the facilities to 
acquire property — and in some of the North- 
ern States, endowed with political, as well as 
civil rights and power, equal with the white 
citizens — still to this day, and with but few 
individual exceptions, the free negroes in every 
State of this Confederacy, are noted for ignor- 
ence, indolence, improvidence, and poverty — 
and very generally, also, for vicious habits, 
and numerous violations of the criminal laws. 
In this plentiful country, whore the only great 
want is for labor, and where ever}' free laborer 
maj^ easily earn a comfortable support, this 
free negro class is so little self-stistaiuing, that 
it now scarcely increases, in general, by pro- 
creation, and would annually decrease tlirough- 
out the United States, if not continually re- 
cruited by new emancipations, and by fugi- 
tives from slavery. The free negroes fare best 
in the slaveholding States, and in them only 
is the whole increase by procreation. In the 
Xorthern or ''free" States, if the free negroes 
were not continuallj' added to by emancii)ated 
and fugitive slaves from the South, there 
would be seen a continued dimiuutionof num- 
ber, froiu the effects of suffering from want, 
and vicious habits. In all this long time of 
freedom, and with great facilities for improve- 
ment, there has not appeared among all these 
free negroes a single individual showing re- 
markable, or even more than ordinary, power 
of intellect — or any power of mind that would 
be deemed worth notice in any individual of 
the white race. Yet, in the Northern States, free 
schools are open to the children of the blacks 
as freely as to the whites — many have re- 
ceived collegiate education — and nothing but 
the immutable decree of God, fixing on tiiem 
mental inferiority, has prevented high grades 
of intellect and of learning, being displayed 
in numerous cases. Further, the absence of 
industry is as general as the inferiority of 
mental powers. Some few free negroes are 
laborious, frugal, provident, and thrifty. A 
very few have acquired considerable amounts 
of property. But these rare qualities were 



16 



not hereditary — and the children of these su- 
perior individuals would be as like as others 
to fall back to the ordinary condition of their 
class. In short, taken throughout, and with 
but few exceptions, the free negro class, in 
every part of this country, is a nuisance, and 
noted for ignorance, laziness, improvidence, 
and vicious habits. 

Experiment of colonizing freed negroes in Li- 
beria. 
But philanthropists, while admitting these 
facts, had associated the continued debase- 
ment of the free negroes in this country to 
their previous low condition, and to their still 
inferior position to the far more numerous 
and dominant white class. Relief from this 
alleged evil to the blacks, and, with it, every 
benefit of industry, tln-ift, and improvement, 
was expected to be obtained by the free negro 
when colonizing Liberia, in Africa. That col- 
ony has now been established forty years. It 
has been sustained, by funds raised by or for 
the Colonization Society, better than anj' 
colony ever before planted and settled by 
white people. It has wanted for nothing 
that the most benevolent and parental care 
of guardianship could provide. The settlers 
were generally of the best of the class of free 
negroes of this countrj'^, or of emancipated 
slaves, selected and provided for by their for- 
mer owners, to enjoy the supposed benefits of 
freedom. Tlie people and the government 
Lave had the protecting, beneficial, and 
always-desired guidance of white intellect; 
and there has been no injurious influence 
from white residents, or foreign interference. 
Besides all the money and commodities so 
liberally bestowed by benevolent individuals 
in this country to plant and support this col- 
ony, some of the State governments have 
afforded to it pecuniar^' or other aid, and the 
Federal Government has given much more 
important, though indirect aid and support, 
and also military and naval aid and protec- 
tion. Further : since the so-called indepen- 
dence and ostensible self-government of Libe- 
ria, the higher orHcers of government have 
been mostly mulattoes, who are as much of 
the white as of the black blood and intellect. 
With all these advantages, and such long sup- 

f)ort by the monej', and direction bj' the intel- 
ect, of the wliites, the colony of Liberia is a 
complete (though a i>artlj^ concealed and de- 
nied) failure. With a soil of exulierant fer- 
tility, and a climate no less bountiful for pro 
duction, the inhabitants of Libei-ia do not yet 
produce sufficicmt food and otlior necessary 
jneans for subsistence. All tlie necessaries of 
life, including rice, sugar, and others of the 
most ready and ])lentiful products of the coun- 
try, sell at such exhorbilaiit prices as to show 
plainly their usual scarcity.* Lately the peo- 



*The following pnragraph, not long slnco, appeared 
In the Richmomi i)rBp!itch, am) various other papers, 
without comnieiit, uml has not been coiilrailieled, and, 
therefore, \» jircKiinieil to bo correet, llioii;;!) the au- 
thority wn* not Hiute.l : 

" .\ correKpomlenl, at Ijlberia, writes that provisions 
are mostly linporteU from the Uulled States. Flour 
raugus from $12 to $1G per barrel; hams and bacuu 



pie were even menaced by actual famine, be- 
cause of the great scarcity of articles of food, 
and the want of means to purchase food from 
abroad. Indolence and aversion to regular • 
labor are universal. Agricultural operations 
and production are in the lowest condition. 
If the long-continued aid of the Colonization 
Society was even now withheld, and also the 
benevolent guidance and influence of the in- 
tellect of the white guardians and protectors, 
this much boasted and falsely eulogised colo- 
ny, and now " Republic of Liberia," would 
rapidly decline below its present low condi- 
tion ; and all the residents, who could not es- 
cape from it, to find shelter under the shadow 
of the white man's presence and government, 
would sink to the state of savage barbarism 
and heathen ignorance and vice, such as had 
formerly overspread the land. The only 
means by which negroes in Africa, as well as 
in America or elsewhere, can generally be 
made industrious and \iseful as laborers, and 
civilized, moral, and christian, will be when 
they are placed in the condition of domestic 
slaves to white masters. 

Still earlier was made, and has been much 
longer continued, the settlement of free ne- 
groes in the colony of Sierra Leone, under the 
direction and care, and at the expense of the 
British Government. It is enough to say for 
this experiment that its failure has been much 
more signal than that of Liberia. The set- 
tlers of Sierra Leone were mostly recaptured 
and uncivilized Africans. In Liberia nearly 
all the colonists had been civilized by the 
best preparatory training of slavery in Ameri- 
ca. This diff'erence alone would serve to ac- 
count for the greater failure of the scheme of 
Sierra Leone. 

While so many whites in Europe, and even 
in America, blinded by prejudice, fanaticism, 
or ignorance of tlie negro characteristics, have 
argued to maintain tlie natural equality of 
the negro mind, the negroes themselves, in- 
cluding the most enlightened among them, 
have universally acknowledged the inferiority 
of their race. One of the results of this ac- 
knowledged inferiority is the well known gene- 
ral unwilliiigiiessof negroes to be governed by 
men of their own race, compared to their usual 
submissive obedience and docility to tlie gov- 
ernment of white rulers. It is well known to 
every slavehuldt r, who has made an overseer 
of one of his slaves, tiiat the greatest difiiculty 
was because of the discontent of the negroes 
to be so governed. They will, in most cases, 
exhibit unwillingness t<^ be cfunmaiuled by the 
most worthy and respectable of tlieir fellows, 
even if allied to them by ties of blood and 
friendsliip, and sometimes will proceed to dis- 
obedience, and even mutinous conduct, when 
they would have submissively obeyed and 
respected any white man as their overseer, 
even if, in truth, less respectable as a man, 
and loss lenient and less intelligent in exercis- 

from 20 to 2S cents per pound ; hard bread $1"^ to $12 
per 1(10 pounds; rice .fS per bushel ; butter O'.'i cents 
ner pound ; salt tlsh from -^12 to !^14 per barrel ; sugar 
25 cents per pound; potatoes ^1 25 per bushel; and 
evorythlDg for family use proportionately high." 



11 



ing the deputed authority of the master. 
This respect for white, and impatience of ne- 
gro rule, extends no less through the class of 
free negroes. It is because of this general 
feeling that so few of this class have been or 
can be prevailed upon to emigrate voluntarily 
to Liberia. In these slaveholding States, the 
free negroes, in their usual degraded moral 
position, and inferior political rights, subject 
indirectly, if not legally, to the dominant 
white race, necessarily must suffer injustice 
and hardship from bad treatment in many 
cases. Yet it is rare that one of them, 
whether the most ignorant and degraded, or 
of the most worthy and intelligent, can be in- 
duced to accept the offered bounty of the Col- 
onization Society, and of the State, to be sent 
to Liberia, and there be made a landholder, 
and an equal sliarer of political rights. So 
strong is their repugnance to be governed by 
negroes, or to live where there are no white 
inhabitants, and, (as they say,) "no gentle- 
men," that if tlie free negroes of Virginia 
should be compelled to choose between being 
sent to Liberia, to be there free citizens, or to 
be made slaves, with their families, to white 
men in Virginia, it is probable that more than 
half of them would choose to become slaves, 
to secure white rulers and protectors. 

Experiment of the independence of negroes in 
Hayti. 

An earlier experiment than Liberia, and on 
a much larger scale, has been tried in the 
insurrection and independence of the slaves 
of St. Domingo. Even this bloody, and finally 
successful insurrection, which is so generally 
understood as presenting full evidence of like 
dangers attending the condition of slaveiy, 
and of the disposition of slaves to rebel, and 
their ability to succeed, if justly viewed, will 
fully prove the reverse of all these positions. 
It was not the slaves of St Domingo, but the 
wealthy and educated class of free mulattoes, 
that commenced the insurrection. And even 
their efforts would have been speedily and 
completelj' quelled, if the contest had been 
left to be decided by the people of St. Do- 
mingo only. But the then insane government 
of the powerful mother country interposed, 
declaring first in favor of equal political 
rights to the free mulattoes, afterwards re- 
pealing that grant, and finally decreeing 
emancipation and equal rights to all the 
slaves. Armies were sent from France to 
enforce these different and opposite decrees. 
And it was by these extraneous circumstances, 
and especially by the armed coercion by 
France, that the final overthrow of the 
whites, and their consequent general mas- 
sacre, were effected, and this formerly beau- 
tiful and fruitful territory was made a deso- 
late wilderness and ruin — as it still remains, 
after seventy years of undisturbed negro 
domination. Even for two years after the 
mad declaration of equal rights to the slaves, 
by the National Convention, and after blood)' 
hostilities had been long carried on between 
the two free classes, (of whites and mulattoes,) 
and after a French army was in the field to 



sustain universal emancipation, the slaves 
were still peacefully laboring, as before, on 
their masters' plantations. But when so long 
and so urgently .invited, and by the then 
stronger party of their superiors, to accept 
their freedom, and (what was to their savage 
dispositions more inviting) to rob, ravage, and 
slay at will, it would have been strange, 
indeed, if these long continued invitations, 
urged by different parties, had not been at 
last obeyed. Then it was, and only by these 
means, that the work of slave insurrection 
was begun, and the subsequent unprecedented 
rapine and slaughter, and unspeakable out- 
rages and horrors, were consummated. If 
there had been only white masters and negro 
slaves, and no foreign and stronger power, 
although the whites were only one-tenth the 
number of their slaves, their mastership would 
never have been seriously disturbed. This, 
however, is not the present question — but the 
successor failure of the subsequent experiment 
of negro independence and self-government. 
And this question does not need discussion, so 
well established is the failure and the long 
continxied, and still continuing desolation of 
the country, and debased condition of its in- 
habitants. Because the facts are notorious 
and indisputable, and can be shown by statis- 
tical documents, it will be enough here to say, 
generally, that in regard to cultivation and 
production, population, social condition, and 
political importance — refinement, morals, and 
religion — in short, in everything that can 
render a country or its people valuable — the 
general decline of St. Domingo (or Hayti) has 
been far greater than any person or party 
could possibly have anticipated. Neither in 
the descendants of the former slaves is there 
any such improvement of comfort, happiness, 
or of capacity, that can compensate for the 
inferiority of the present highest and ruling 
class, compared to their former white mas- 
ters. Of course, the individuals composing 
the present higher classes, by the aid of 
wealth, and means for education, are much 
better informed than they could have been if 
remaining slaves. But the general or aver- 
age amount of intelligence, as of their indus- 
try and productions, is far below what it was 
formerly — and the class of laborers is far 
below what they would have been, if they 
had continued slaves, and for tlie last seventy 
years had been operated on by the civilizing 
influence of slavery. Further : as much as 
the ca.se of St. Domingo proves from my ar- 
gunieut, after all, it was not a trial of a really 
freed negro people. The black general Touis- 
sant, (the only truly great man yet known 
of the negro race,) who, after suppressing the 
civil war, assumed and exercised despotic and 
severe authority, cotnpelled the former slaves 
to return to the plantations, and to labor, 
under military coercion, and severe punish- 
ments for disobedience. Thej' were to receive 
a stated share of the products of the land (one- 
fliird,) and were coerced to labor by govern- 
ment officials, instead of by individual mas- 
ters. But under this much less efficient, ben- 
eficial, and profitable form of bondage, the 



18 



former slaves were not less than formerly 
compulsory laborers, and driven by corporeal 
punishment, as they continue to be to this 
time. Tills system of discij)line and constraint 
is, of necessity, extremely' defective. But im- 
perfect as it is, compared to individual slaverj', 
it has served to retard the rapidity of the 
descent which thi~ community has been, and 
still is, making to unproductive and savage 
barbarism. If any civilized people were now 
(as ought to be done, and will be done in 
some future time,) to conquer and re-colonize 
Hayti, and reduce the whole laboring, or 
destitute, or idle classes to their former condi- 
tion of domestic slavery, the change would be 
beneficial for the re-enslaved classes, for the 
whole community and countr}', and for the 
commercial and civilized world. 

In the seventj' years of independence of. St. 
Domingo, and of freedom from invasion and 
foreign aggression, except Touissant, (who 
had been a slave, and continued to be perfect- 
ly illiterate,) tliere has not arisen a single 
man who would bedeemed of more than ordi- 
nary ability, if he had been of the white race. 
The higher classes there possess all the still 
remaining wealth of the country, and can 
command every facility for education, and 
mental instruction and improvement. There 
have ruled and flourished hundreds of high 
dignitaries, militarj', political, and clerical — 
emperors and kings, dukes, generals, and bish- 
ops. But theie has not yet appeared even 
one man whom all the advantages of wealth, 
education, and rank have enabled to exhibit 
the possession of strong or remarkable mental 
power. Is not this alone, sufficient to prove 
the natural and great inferiority of the negro 
mind ? 

Mxperhnejit of general emancipation in the 
British colonies. 

A fourth great experiment of negro freedom 
has been devised and conducted \mder the 
direction, ])atronage, and philanthropic care 
of tiie enlightened and powerful British Gov- 
ernment. This was the general emancipation 
of the slaves in all the Bi-itish colonies of the 
West India Islands, British Guiana, and 
wherever AlVican and domestic slavery had be- 
fore existed under British authority. Proofs 
and details of facts are notcalledforin this case. 
The failure is universal, signal, and undeniable, 
(with a few notable exceptions.) even by the 
most zealous of the previous British advocates 
of the act of cmancij)ation, or the abolition- 
ists who continue to ui'ge the like measure, 
•with the like results manifestly impending, 
for our slaveholding States. 

Previous to this extensive, simultaneous, and 
peaceful emancipation, the abolitionists of 
England, and elsc^where, had maintained that, 
after emancipation, the negroes wouhl inune- 
diately beconn; hirctl laborers — and (judging 
erroneou-^ly from Ihe condition of things in 
England) tli;it llu! free labor thus suii|>lie<l 
would bi' even in'u-c valuable and cheap lo the 
employers than the former slave labor. On 
the contrary, universal idleness of the blacks 
has taken the place of the former universal in- 



dustry in the British islands. As the philan- 
thropic British sentiment which induced the 
emancipation, (and forced it on the former 
slaveholders,) cannot resort to the wholesome 
discipline of Touissant, to force the newly 
freed blacks to labor, the general neglect of 
labor, and decrease of production, are even 
worse and more hopeless in .Jamaica, than in 
St. Domingo. And although the continued 
supremacy of British Government and author- 
ity, and the presence of British militarj^ and 
naval forces, have so far secured the lands to 
the white owners, and prevented general con- 
fiscation of property, and massacre of the few 
whites, still Jamaica and the other British 
West Indian colonies are totally ruined in re- 
gard to industry, production, and all social 
blessings. 

If required, or suitable to the occasion, 1 
could quote at greater length than all this 
article besides, testimony of facts, and statis- 
tical and official reports, going to show the 
utter ruin of industry and production in Hay- 
ti and the British colonies — the unquestion- 
able results of the suppression of slavery. 
Many of such facts may be seen in the " Pre- 
sent State of Hayti," written by .James Frank- 
lin, an intelligent Englishman, and former 
resident — in Bigelow's " Notes on Jamaica " — 
and extracts from offici.nl reports', to the British 
Parliament, and from British (and anti-slave- 
ry) writers, inserted in Bledsoe's "Liberty 
and Slavery." I will give here, meivly as ex- 
anqiles, the following few short passages: 

The sugar exported from St. Domingo, now 
Hayti, in 1789, was 672,000,000 lbs.; in 1806, 
it was 47,-516,531 lbs.; in 182.5, it was 2,020 
lbs.; and in 1832, none. Franklin (whose 
book appeared as far back as 1810, even then) 
said: "There is every reason to apprehend 
that it (Hayti) will recede into irrecoverable 
insignificance, poverty, and disorder." 

Bigelow, a Northern Abolitionist and negro- 
phili-st, says of Jamaica in 1850: "Capable, 
as it is, of producing almost everything, and 
actually producing nothing which might not 
become a staple with a proper application 
of capital and skill, its inhabitants are misera- 
bly poor, and daily siiiking deeper and deeper 
into (he utter helplessness of abject want 
Shipping has deserted her poi-fs, her magnifi- 
cent sugar and coffee plantations are running 
to weeds, her private dwellings are falling to 
decay, the comforts and luxuries which belong 
to industrial j'yrosiierity have been out off, one 
by one, from her inhabilaiiis, and the day, I 
think, is at haml when there will be none 
left to repi'Csent the wealth, intelligence, and 
hospitality for which the.Iamaica planter was 
once distinguished." Henry Carey, another 
Northern and anti-slnvei'v writer, says: "It is 
impossible to read Mr. Bigelow's volume with- 
out ai-riving at the conclusion that the free- 
dom granted to the negro has had little effect, 
except that of enabling iiim to live at the ex- 
pense of the planter so long as anything re- 
mained. Sixteen years of freedom did not ap- 
pear, to its author, to have "advanced the dig- 
nity of labor, or of the laboring classes, one 
})article, while it had ruined the proprietors of 



19 



the land." Yet, while all Bigelow'e facts go 
to prove these evils to be the result of the in- 
curable indolence and improvidence of the 
freed negroes, so inveterate is his negi'ophilisni 
that he ascribes their indolence ami degra<la- 
tion to the continued residence of the few re- 
maining whites, and looks to the removal of 
the latter as the proper remedy. And, in an- 
ticipating tills future e.ent, and the benefit of 
an unmixed negro population in the British 
West Indies, he also, with all complacency, and 
without anj' intinuition of objection on his 
part, supposes that these islands will then form 
a portion of the United States — and, as must 
be inferri^d, as a part of their imi>roved con- 
dition, must necessarily then be represented 
in Congress by negro delegates. 

"The finest land in the woi-ld," says Bige- 
low, "may be hail at any j)rice, and alujost for 
the asking." Labor ''receives no compensa- 
tion, and the product of labor does not seem 
to know how to find its way to market." 

Mr. Robert Baird, A. M., (quoted by Profes- 
sor Bledsoe,) is au Englishman, and, like Bige- 
low, a strong approver of the previous eman- 
cipation of the slaves in the English colonies; 
and, like Bigelow, while he arrays numerous 
strong fa-'ts to sliov/ the ruinous results of tliat 
act, he ascribes the evil, not to the act itself, 
but to the want of some further supposed 
measure* of reform. He says: 

"Let any one who thinks that the extent 
and clamor of the complaint [of the former 
planters and proprietors] exceeds the magni- 
tude of the distress which has called it forth, 
go to the West Indies and judge for himself 
Let him see, with his own ej'cs, the neglected 
and abandoned estates, the uncultivated fields, 
fast hurrying back into a state of nature — the 
dismantled and silent machinery, the crumb- 
ling walls, and deserted mansions, which are 
familiar sights in most of the West Indian 
colonies. Let him, then, transport himself to 
the Spanish Islands of Porto Rico and Cuba, 
and witness the life and activity which in 
these slave colonies prevail. Let him observe 
for himself tiie activity of the slavers, the im- 
provements daily making in the cultivation of 
the fields, and ti^e processes carried on at the 
sugar mills, and the general indescribable air 
of thriving and prosperity which surrounds 
the whole," Jic. 

Tlie degradation of British Guiana since. 
and because of, emancipation, as shown in the 
Parliamentary and other official reports, is still 
worse. But I will quote no more, except a 
passage of general comment from the British 
historian, Alison: "The negroes," says he, 
"who, ill a state of slavery, were comfortable 
and prosperous beyond any peasantiy in the 
world, and rapidly approaching the condition 
of the most opulent serfs of Europe, have 
been, by an act of emancipation, irretrievably 
consigned to a state of barbarism." Yet, even 
with this admission, I presume that Alison, 
like every other Englishman of distinction, 
and of high reputation as an author or states- 
'man, (excepting Carlyle only,) is an enemy of 
negro slavery, and a denouncer of the inicjuity 
of slaveholding. With all this present una- 



nimity of opposition to, and violent denuncia- 
tion of, African slavery, the prediction may be 
ventured, that a change of opinion is about to 
take place. Reason and truth will not much 
longer be kept out of sight by prejudiced and 
ignoi'ant fanaticism, even in England and the 
Northern American States. 

But with such ]iroofsof entire failure of the 
emancipation scheme in tlie British colonies, 
and w)th thousands of like facts that can be 
adduced from statistical and official reports, 
or testified by unimpeachable and intelligent 
witnesses, so "besotted and blind is fanaticism, 
and so strongly does it cling to its first errors, 
and reject all light, and truth, that a few men 
have dared to testily and to publish, that the 
experiment has been eminently successful — 
that the lands had increased in price and in 
production — the negroes were industi'ious — 
even their former jiroprietovs were benefitted 
and content, and that everything had been 
improved. J. J. Gurney, of England, first pub- 
lished an elaboi-ate report of such false state- 
ments, alleged to be on his personal examina- 
tion ; and his pamphlet was largely circulated, 
by anti-slavery advocates iu the United 
States. Even within the last few months, the 
same general assertions were made by a speak- 
er, without contradiction, in a jniblic meeting 
in one of the Northern cities. This statement 
was matched by, if not copied from, the fol- 
lowing, which was republished in tlie "African 
Repository," the organ of the Colonization So- 
ciety in this country, without comment, or ex- 
pression of even a doubt: 

"The British West Indies. — At a meeting 
in London to take measures to present an ap- 
propriate testimonial to Dr. Livingstone, tlie 
African traveler, i\Ir. Montgomery Martin 
made the following statement: 'He had re- 
cently visited the West Indies to 'ascertain if 
the emancipation of the slaves had jiroduced 
ruin there. He found there a free, happy, and 
prosperous population, (hear, hear;) and 
speaking commercially, the West Indies now 
yield more rum, sugar, and other produce, than 
they had ever done during the existence of 
slaveiT, (hear, hear.) Since the abolition of 
slavery in the West Indies, not a drop of blood 
was shed, not a single crime was committed — 
nor was there destruction of property through- 
out the whole of the West Indies." (^Ch^ers.) — • 
K Y. Col. Jour. „ 1^ ( ., , ~^s '<i '}.-,*■* . . ' 

Robespierre, in the French Contention, 
when urging the emancipation of the slaves 
in St. Domingo, and in answer to predictions 
of opponents of the ruin that would follow, 
uttered the memorable sentiment, "Perish the 
colonies, rather than sacrifice one iota of our 
principles!" The Northern Abolitionists, our 
fellow-citizens and jiolitical "brethren," con- 
tinue to reassert, in effect, Robespierre's atro- 
cious declaration, after they now well know, 
what their great exemplar, the bloody Robes- 
pierre, did not know, the wide-spread ruin 
and destruction that would follow the practi- 
cal estaljlishment of their d^kgnia and purpose 
of negro emanci])ation. Tlieir procedure saj's, 
louder than words could do, "Perish the 
wealth and all production of the Southern 



'SO 



States, -with all that refines, improves, and dig- 
nifies maDkind within their bounds; y)erish 
there, the white race, men, women, and babes, 
by massacre, so that the negro slaves shall be 
freed! Perish even Northern manufactures, 
commerce, and wealth, if dependent on the 
products of Soutliern slaveiy — and perish the 
industry, the comforts, the civilization, the 
morals, religion of the slaves, and even the 
slaves themselves, if to be necessarily caused 
by their receiving the gift of freedom! " 

The alleged cfreatest atrocities of negro slavery 

considered in comparison with those of free 

society, or class slavery. 

The main objections of the opposers and de- 
nouncers of slavery may be stated under two 
genei'al heads, viz: first, the great injustice 
and wrong of subjecting human beings, our 
natural equals, to slaverj-, and of the so hold- 
ing them and their porterity ; and second, the 
hardships and sufferings of the persons sub- 
jected to and held in slavery. The numerous 
other objections urged are incidental, and of 
minor importance to these. 

The alleged injustice and wrong-doing of 
producing or maintaining the relations and 
opposite conditions of master and slave, have 
already been here considered in another con- 
nection. If it is unjust and wrongful, it is in 
the same manner as property, wealth, and po- 
litical rank and ])o\ver, in almost every civi- 
lized and even free country, are yjosspssed by 
a small number of the people, while the far 
greater number are without land or other pro- 
perty, without political power, or, perhaps, 
even political rights, and with scarcely a hope 
of acquiring either, in a whole life of unceas- 
ing toil and privation. Except some of the 
most rabid socialists and disorganizcrs, as 
Proudhon, who declares all "property to be 
robbery," no English philanthropist, or North- 
ern anti-slaveiy writer, has denounced all he- 
reditar}- magistrates and rulers as usurpers, 
and all proj)erty-holders as unjust and iVaudu- 
lent possessors — and declared that both these 
classes of usurpers and robbers ought to be 
deprived of their acqiiisitions for the benefit 
of the muliitude of destitute persons, whose 
equal rights had V)een thereby violated. The 
abstract right of all mankind to personal 
liberty, and tlie right to equal participation in 
the govermncnt, and of ]ir(qierty in land, (if no 
more,) stand upon precisely ('(jual and like 
grounds. The end obtainetl by eacli of these 
several violations of natural and e([ual rights, 
or claims, is tlie same — tlie general and great 
benefit of the whole community, and of all 
mankind — even including (and especially as to 
personal slavery) the class least favored in the 
distributiuii of rights and proj)erty. Tlie ])os- 
sessor of hereditary authority, in free Eng- 
land, or of authority delegated by hereditary 
rulers, either civil or military, lay or clerical, 
is to the jioor and starving laborer, as much a 
framlulent and forcible usurper of the power 
and property of which tlie lalxjrer is entirely 
destitute, as the slaveholder is unjustly de]iriv- 
ing his slave of any right to freedom. Vet, 
juct as is this comjmrisou, uo English monarch- 



ist or Northern capitalist seems to have 
thought of the parity of the difl"erent cases. 

The second great objection to negro slavery 
is the severe and cruel treatment of the slaves, 
and the great sufferings incidental to the con- 
dition of every slave. It is, a certain and de- 
plorable tiuth, that wherever men have power 
over others, there will occur cases of un- 
just and sometimes cruel exercise of power. 
Sneh cases occur even where the superior in- 
dividual, or class, has no interest to serve in op- 
pressing the inferior; and they are much more 
frequent, if not general, when the unjust op- 
pression of the infei'ior, and subject, is advanta- 
geous to the superior person or class. Thus there 
are many (though still exceptional) cases of 
slaveholders in these SrKithern States maltreat- 
ing their slaves, although such procedure is 
generally opposed to, and never promotive of, 
the master's interest. And so iji the Northern 
States and in England, there are many (yet 
also exceptional) eases of husbands using their 
superior power to maltreat, and even to tor- 
ture or kill wives — ])arents their J'oung chil- 
di'en — and adult children their parents. But 
with all these cases, and manj^ of them of 
horrible cruelty and atrocity, the relations of 
masters to their personal slaves, as well as of 
parents to children, and husbands to wives, are 
much more generally kind, just in intention, 
and beneficient. The owner of negro slaves 
is interested in obtaining from them the great- 
est amount of continued useful labor and ser- 
vice ; and also, (and especially, at their present 
high prices,) to have the property continued 
by the preservation of health and long life', 
and increased in successive generations. These 
objects, it is manifest, must be opposed, if not 
defeated entirely, by the slaves being too 
severely worked, or being subjected to other 
suffering from Avant of suflicient food, and 
other necessaries of life and health. Further: 
capricious and tyrauical treatment of slaves, 
even though not damaging their bodih' ability 
and health, would be as detrimental to th'e 
master's interest, by producing iliscontent and 
disobedience. Besides these motives for just 
and kind treatment, addressed to the self-inte- 
rest of the master of slaves, there are others 
which appeal even inore strongly to the best 
feelings and attributes of man. The intimate 
association of the master and his slaves, through 
years of direction and service — in many cases 
continued from early childhood to death — 
must produce, and does jtroduce, strong and 
mutual feelings of personal regard and attach- 
ment. In very many cases this attach)nent of 
love lias such sway, that the master's kindness 
of feeling overpowers his judgment, and he 
fails to maintain the proper degree of discipline 
and obedience that is necessarj* for the well- 
being and hapjiiness of the slaves, as well as 
for the profit of the master. The sternest 
master, however deficient in the softer feelings, 
has at least more of personal attaelmient to 
his own slaves than to other persons unknown 
to, and unconnected with him. And the 
smallest share of this universally existing feel- 
ing of personal affection, is just so much more 
than is felt, or can possibly be felt, by either 



21 



party in auy form of class slavery, oi- of sub- [led, finally, to the ruin of the propi-ietor, and, 
jection of labor to capital. Thus, whether | consequently, the subse(j,uent sale of the 



reasoning a priori from the nature of man, or 
deducing conclusions from existing known 
and g<^neral facts, there are many and strong 
reasons to induce the owner of domestic slaves 
to be kind in his treatment, and to strive to 
avoid injustice and cruelty. Such aregenerallj', 
and of necessity must be, the general accom- 
paniments and'condition of slavery in these 



slaves? But, more generally, the less extent of 
such errors only causes to the proprietor such 
loss of profit as he can bear without destruction 
of his business, or diminution of his original 
capital. But any such diminution of profit 
to a great manufacturer oi- mine owner, would 
be ruinous. The competition for purchasere, 
among great proprietors of manufactories, and 



Southern States, at the present, and in recent for the trade of the world, is as keen as is the 



times. But I admit that the case might be 
(and has been elsewhere) very different. 
While England supplied America with African 
slaves, negroes were so cheap in the British 
"West Indies, and wherever else slaves were 
then admitted, that the master's self-interest 
was small to preserve his slave's life to old age, 
and no increase by procreation was desired, or 
would have been proiitable. It was cheaper 
to buy an adult male negro, than either to 
rear one from infancy, or to maintain his in- 
firm and useless old age. Hence, according to 
human nature, (and just as capitalists in both 
Old and New England now act towards their 
free laborers, or class slaves,) self-interest 
generally overcame anj- promptings of hu- 
manity. It was to the gain of the owners to 
treat their slaves hardly and cruelly, and, ac- 
cordingl}-, it was so done generally. Neither 
were the promptings of self-interest often 
counteracted by any feeling of attachment to 
the newly imported, brutal, debased, and 
savage African negroes. Moreover, most of 
the owners, in the British "West India Islands 
were non-residents, and, therefore, were in- 
capable of forming personal attachment to any 
of their unknown slaves. 

This worst and very deplorable condition of 
negro slaves was owing to accidental and extra- 
neous circumstances, (and mainly to the greedy 
" and unscrupulous avarice of England, minis- 
tei-ed to by the great profits of the slave-trade,) 
and would have been but temporary and tran- 
sient there, as was the soinewhat similar early 
condition of slavery in Virginia. But the ne- 
cessarv hardships of free laborers, and the 
cruel sufferings of class slavery instead of be- 
ing transient, are fixed, and will be increasing 
as long as the competition for labor, and the 
pi-essure of want, shall continue to operate. 
The class of employers of free labor cannot 
possibly feel any love or personal attachment 
for their numerous and often changed hire- 
lings. The only rule on which they act (or 
indeed can act)"towards them, as laborers, is 
to obtain from them as much work as possi- 
bly can be performed, for as low wages as will 
be taken for such work. This is not even a mat- 
ter of choice with the employers. They have 
their places in a complicated system of social 
machinery, and each one is compelled to act 
his required part of the general operation. It 
is often the case that an individual owner and 
director of a plantation, worked by his negro 
slaves, either through his own indolence and 
carelessness, or his too kind indulgence to his 
slaves, or both these causes combined, fails to 
obtain half of his proper products and income. 
Such neglect and waste of means have often 



competition fur employment among their la- 
borers. Manj' of such ca[iitalists are as con- 
scientious and humane men as aiij' other em- 
ployers of labor, and they probably perform 
as many acts of charity, as charity, as other 
rich people. But an war/es, no employer oi 
numerous laborers is able to add to the pit- 
tance that will engage the needed labor, 
though knowing it to be inadequate. A very 
large part of the expen.se of these great in- 
dustrial operations is tlie wages of labor. A 
master mafiufacturer is bound, by the current 
market values, to take certain rates of prices 
for his products ; which prices return to him, 
on the general average, but a fair and proper 
profit on his capital and expenses. If, to 
make these sales, and secure this profit, he can 
and does hire his laborers at twenty pence for 
each day's work, he could not add two pence 
to that rate of wages without taking that 
amount out of his own previous and but mod- 
erate profits. lie might be sensible that his 
laborers required higher wages to sustain 
health and life, and his feelings of compassion 
and benevolence might strongly urge him to 
make the increase; but for the great expense 
of labor to be increased to him even by one- 
tenth more than was paid by all his competi- 
tors, could not possibly be done without de- 
struction to his profits, and ruin and speedy 
stoppage to the business. Such a man would 
pay his share of tax, under the poor law, for 
aiding to support his and other pauper labo- 
rers, and, besides, might give alms voluntarily 
to the extent of his ability; but as an em- 
ployer of laborers, and payer of their wages, 
he would have no choice but to fulfil his hard 
and severe part in the great system of |'free 
labor," urged to the utmost by competition, 
and by want. 

And precisely in like manner acts every 
employer of labor, or purchaser of the pro- 
ducts of labor. It is the universal law of 
trade, of which no particular departures from, 
or exceptions to, can prevent or affect the 
general operation, that every one will seek to 
hire the lowest priced labor, and to buy the 
lowest priced products of labor. All the 
knowledge of the facts of want and hunger, 
and consequent vice and misery, and all that 
benevolence and charity can feel and wish, 
cannot materially alter or alleviate the work- 
ing to its end of the great law of competition, 
and its deplorable consequences. 

There arc but few, even among the most 
fanatical denouncers of negro slavery, who, if 
acquainted with both conditions, would not 
admit that the far greater amount of suffer- 
ing is to be found in the class which they 



22 



falsely term "free laborers." Yet, to remedy, 
or greatly alleviate these certain, permanent, 
and growing distresses of free society, no 
statesman has even attempted; and, except 
wild and disorganizing socialists, no reformer 
has proposed even visionary means for relief. 
Yet all these statesmen, theoretical reformers, 
and socialists of every sect, who have all the 
horrors of class slavery standing and growing 
under tlieir eyes, neglect its miseries and vic- 
tims to unite in one universal howl of denunci- 
ation of negro slavery in this countrj- — whicli 
is a far happier condition than that of any 
class of free laborers in England, and the hap- 
piest and best condition in whicli the negro 
race can possibly be placed. 

Expedi^ncji of the pfrmanence of negro slavery, 
and of the extension of the area. 
Assuming as an indisputable fact that God 
has created and designed the negro race to be 
inferior in intellect to the wliite — that the 
negro possesses in a superior degree the qual- 
ities of docility and obedience, and of ability 
to endure the heat and miasmatic air of ti'op- 
ical climates, and that he only can safely 
labor in tliese most i'rnitful regions of the 
earth — while liis feebleness of mind and indo- 
lence of body prevent his voluntary and sus- 
tained labor, even to preserve life — that the 
white man can and does direct, control, and 
compel the labors of the negro beneficially for 
both, an ' best for profitable ]>roduction, for 
civilization, and for tlie general well-being of 
the world — I thence deduce the expedienc}- 
and propi-iety of not only maintaining, and 
preserving inviolate, the existing condition of 
African slavery, but of its being extended to 
where^'er the condition of the earth and its 
inhabitants would be manifestly improved 
thereby. Kearly all Spanish America has 
been degraded, and is now sunk below the 
hope for resuscitation, partly in consequence 
of tiie previous general mixture of blood of 
the inferior witli the superior race — and still 
more because of the subsequent extinction of 
slavery, and the end of the former subordina- 
tion of the African and native races to the 
European. With the throwing off the op- 
pressive Spanish yoke, and declaring the 
politi(;al independence of all these extensive 
and fruitful colonies of Spain, it was univer- 
sally exjiected that they would ra|)idly im- 
prove, and rise, in every attribute of worth 
and greatness. But all these sanguine and 
philanthropic hojies and expectations have 
Been miserahly and completely disappointed. 
By each of these revolutionary governments, 
miscalled free and republican, negro slavery 
was abolished by law, and e(|ual ]>olitical 
riglits decreed to all classes of the popula- 
tion. Tile consequence was an inmn-diate and 
progressive decline of imlustry and produc- 
tion ; and now, after forty years of political 
indepeiidcnee, general security from foreign 
invaders, and with the possession of (their so 
called) freedom and republi<'an government, 
eaeii and all of liiese rej>ublies are but an- 
archies, more degraded and wretched in cver^' 
respect than when under tiie oppression and 



tyranny of their former colonial government. 
Of all ti-opical and South America, Brazil, 
which escaped civil war, and Cuba, which has 
continued a Spanish province, only, have 
retained the institution of African slavery. 
And these two countries only, and certainly 
for that cause, have greatly extended and 
exceeded their former production, notwith- 
standing all the evils of bad government in 
both these countries, and for Cuba, the most 
horrible political oppression by the mother 
country. From the mongrel races that oc- 
cupy Slexieo, Central America, the immense 
basins of the Orinoco, the upper Amazon, and 
the La Plata and its tributaries, and which 
are everywhere spreading and maintaining 
desolation over these fair and fertile regions of 
the earth, there is no hope for improvement 
under their present policy, and their miscalled 
free institutions. If any or all of these great 
countries had been subdued, and occupied, and 
governed bj' riien of Anglo-Saxon race, and 
for even the last forty years of their free exist- 
ence had been tilled by negi'o slaves, there 
would have been as rnuch and as rapid im- 
provement made in population, wealth, and 
greatness, as there has been of actual decline 
and degi'adation under the different existing 
conditions. And these countries, and their 
inhabitants, will still continue to decline, until 
the only present and sure remed}' s'.all be in 
operation. No tropical countrj-, or people, in 
any age, has ever greatly prospered, or been 
raised to a high grade of industry, production, 
refinement, and moral worth, except by the 
aid, and general diffusion of domestic slavery. 
And in modern times, the important and valu- 
able products of sugar and cotton, have no- 
where been great articles of exportation, 
except whefl ootained from the labor of do- 
mestic slaves. 

Causes of the prosperity of the Northern States 
v'ithout the aid of slavery. 

It may be objected to the claims here made 
for the superior economy of slave labor in new 
countries, and wherever hibiir is scarce and dear, 
that the Northern States of this Confederacy, 
without slaver}-, iiave prospered as much and 
(as most have said) much more than the slave- 
holding States. There are sufdcient causes of 
all that is well founded in this claim of equal- 
ity or superiority, and for the outward appear- 
ance of much more than is true. 

Tiie settlers of all the present United States 
brought with them from Eurojie habits of in- 
dustry and artificial wants, whicli had been 
pi'oduccd and cultivated in their ancestors by 
their former, and the:i extinct, old system of 
slavery. The first colonists of xVniei'ica, though 
settlers in a new country, were an old people, 
with cstablislied habits of industry. A cold 
and severe climate, and generall}' land but 
moderately pioductive, required and com- 
|.>elled labor and frugality. To be indolent 
and wasteful would be e(juivaleiit to starving 
before the end of the next winter of six months 
duration. Fuither, the settlers of New Eng- 
land were still more impelled to exertion by 
their religious fanaticism, which had first 



23 



made them seek a new home on a barren soil, 
and under a rigorous climate, ;uid prepared 
them to endure any degree of labor and pri- 
vation. Not only the virtues, but the follies 
and the vices nourished by the religion and 
theocratic government of this peculiar people, 
served to stimulate effort and labor much 
more than ordinary physical necessities and 
inducements alone would have done. But, in 
addition, the puritan Xew Englanders availed 
themselves, as much as was serviceable to 
them, not only of African slaves, but of their 
Indian captives, whv'm they systematically re- 
duced to domestic slavery. And they contin- 
ued to hold their slaves until after the war of 
the Revolution. But in so cold a countr}', and 
where the products of agricultural labor were 
of so -little amount, slave labor was of much 
less value than in countries under opposite 
conditions. As soon as there was even a mod- 
erate supply of free labor, it became cheaper 
to hire such, even at higher rates, for the few 
months only when it was available, than to 
maintain a slave throughout the j'car, and for 
months together of winter, when no agricul- 
tural work could be performed. Hence the 
time for the natural and economical extinc- 
tion of slavery in New England soon arrived. 
And if the masters had not had (and used) 
the resource of selling their slaves to the 
South, they would have emancipated them, 
not for any conscientious scruples, (which now 
so heavily oppress them in regard to Southern 
slavery,) but for profit. The like reasons and 
causes operated more slowly to extinguish do- 
mestic slavery in the middle Atlantic States ; 
and the growing anti-slavei-y doctrines served 
still more to forward and extend the removal 
of slavery where it had existed, and to forbid 
and prevent its being established in the new 
Northwestern States. The longer and more 
rigorous winters there also prevented regular 
or continuous agricultural labor, and would 
iiave served to detract much from the profits 
of negro slavery-, if it had existed there. But 
if both law and fanaticism had not forbidden, 
itwo\ild be both profitable and highly benefi- 
cial to use negro slaves to a limited extent in 
all the Northwestern States, and especiallj^ for 
house servants. And they would have been 
indispensable, even for agiicultural laboi's, de- 
spite the disadvantages of climate, if a supply 
for such service had but been continually fur- 
nished in the hordes of destitute European 
immigrants, who, of course, all go to these 
States, or newer territories, where labor is 
most in demand, and, th'erefoie, is most highly 
paid for. 

But there are other and stronger reasons for 
the prosperity and success of the Northern 
States. Even after negro slavery was re- 
moved from them, its continueil existence and 
extension in the Southern States served to 
foster and stimulate, and reward tlie industry 
of the Northern States. Southern products, 



ever since the existence of the Federal consti- 
tution, have been made tributary to Northern 
navigation, commerce, and manufactures — and 
the tril)Ute has been made more and more 
oppressive to the South, and profitable to the 
North, by meaiis of federal legislation giving 
bounties, direct oi' indirect, to Northern in- 
dustry, capital, and general interests. It will 
never be known by tlie South, nor appreciated 
b}' the Norlh, how much tril)ute has thus 
been paid by Southern industry and capital, 
(and all derived from the products of negro 
slavery,) to swell Northern profits and wealth, 
until the existing union of the Northern and 
Southern States shall be dissolved. Should 
that contingency occui-, then, for the first time, 
will the Northern States have to support 
themselves from their own resources, and 
without the great and unacknowledged aid to 
their wealth derived from the slave labor and 
the products of the South — and they will then 
learn to know the value of all that thej" have 
lost. 

The intellect of the irorld coming to the appro- 
val and support of negro slavery. 

The defenders and vindicators of negro 
slavery would have nothing to fear for the 
final and complete success of their cause, if 
the question were to be decided by reason 
and argument, founded upon fads and expe- 
rience. But the case is very different. In 
these United States, the rights and property of 
slaveholders and of the slaveholdirg States, 
are assailed in every possible manner by the 
opinions and votes, and also the lawless action, 
of the more numerous j)eople of the Northern 
States, directed by ambitious and unscrupulous 
leaders, who excite and array ignorant fanat- 
icism in the Northern States in opposition to 
slavery in the South, merely to gain political 
power and rank for themselves. Under this 
great outside pressure of the now powerful 
Northern States, aided by the fanatical or 
])retended philanthropy of England and 
Finance, it may be, that blind fanaticism, stim- 
ulating and directing illegal and incendiary 
action, may be able to extinguish slavery, 
(even though in a general extermination of 
the black race in the States where slavery 
now exists,) before good sense, truth, and 
sound reasoning, all of which are now extend- 
ing in influence, shall come to the rescue. 
Tlie 'existing contest between the defenders 
and the assailants of negro slavery is one in 
which intellect is, or is about to be, arrayed 
on one side, and the brute force of ignorant 
and deluded numbers, on the other. The 
result of the contest will be of vital impor- 
tance to the Southern States, either for weal 
or wo, and, in a very considerable measure, to 
ever3' class and condition of all America and 
Europe, and to the future civilization and wel- 
fare of the world. 



A.PFENDIX. 



THE INFLUENCE OF SLAYERY, OE OF ITS ABSENCE, ON 
MANNEES, MORALS, AND INTELLECT. 

[Extract from an Address to the Virginia State Agricultural Society, read at the First 
Annual Meeting, December 16, 1852, by Edmund Rufkin, President; and then printed by 
order of the Society.] 



* * * * The subject upon whieli I pro- 
pose now to offer my opinions and remarks, 
though not strictly agricultural, is of the high- 
est degree of interest and importance to the 
whole agricultural community of this and the 
other Southern States of the confederacy. 
This is, the influence of the institution of do- 
mestic or individual slavery on manners, intel- 
lect, and moralo, and on the welfare of both 
masters and slaves; and in these respects 
compared to the influence of the slavery of 
class to class, which, in one or other form, 
either now prevails, or soon will occur, in 
every civilized country where domestic slaverj' 
is not found. 

The institution of domestic slavery, its ef- 
fects, influences and probable consequences, 
constitute the great and all-absorbing subject 
of discussion at the present time — of defensive 
and too often apologetic argument in the South- 
ern States, and of aggressive and fierce de- 
Bunciation throughout the Northern States of 
this confederacy. The subject is as broad and 
varied as it is important. To be fully discus- 
sed it would require consideration in sundry 
aspects, but of wliich eaoh one may be treated 
separately and distinctly. The expediency 
and rightfulness of slavery may be considered 
either as a question of religion and morals — 
of public policy and political influence — or of 
domestic economy and influence upon private 
interests and on the habits and manners of so- 
ciety. The former aud chief branches of the 
general question have been already discussed 
by able writers, to whose arguments I could 
add no light, even if this occasion permitted 
BO wide a range of discussion. But the latter- 
named branch has had less attention, or de- 
fence, on our part ; and as its consideration is 
intimately connected with agriculture and ag- 
ricultural interests, in this connection mainly, 
and as suitable to this occasion, I will now 
offer some r€maks upon the influence of the 
existing institution of African slavery, on the 
social qualities, manners, and welfare of the 
agricultural class in these Southern States. 



This one and limited relation of slavery to / 
agricultural interests, requires a still further f 
division, into Ist: The question of the com- ,' 
parative pecuniary profit of slave labor, or of ; 
its absence and its substitutes ; and 2d : The , 
question of social aud moral advantages and ;% 
disadvantages. The first of these subdivis- 
ions, important as it is to our interests, and .) 
certain and easy as would be the demonstration 
of the result, cannot be here discussed. The 
superior pecuniary profit of slave-labor is a 
subject of statistics, of calcidation and detail, 
which would be inadmissible at this time and. 
place. But it is not required to reach the 
proof through such a course of argument. I . 
may assume as granted and unquestionable, i 
the fact almost universally admitted in the .f 
Southern States, that slave-labor is in our cir- ( 
cumstances, more profitable to the employer^ t 
and to agricultural interests, than could be i 
anj^ possible substituted labor. Dismissing, ■ 
then, this important subdivision of this sub- . t 
ject as settled, I will direct my observations it 
to private interests other than pecuniary, as I 
affected by the influence of the institution of = 
slavery. 

It has been a fertile subject of declamation 
and denunciation among the opposers of ; 
slaver}', that the existence of domestic slavery ." 
operated to corrupt manners and moi-als. 
Every wide-spread and pervading institution, ,. 
however beneficial in general ett'ect, must also, 
have some adverse effect or influence in minor 
points, or exceptional cases. This is true in 
regard to every great institution of public 
economy', government, morals, or even reli- 
gion. He is a poor reasoner who judges not ,; 
by general rules, but by the exceptions. And .o 
that is the mode of argument generally adopt- n 
ed to oppose and denounce the institution of » 
slavery. The so-called facts or premises, if ' 
not either entirely false aud impossible, ss is 
generally the case, are but rare exceptions to 
general rules. 

The great economical objections to slave. , 
labor ar« these: The compulsion of authority. 



26 



and the fear of punishment, to the slave, are 
less potent than the pressure of want, and de- 
sire of gain, stimulating free laborers. Hence 
slaves labor less assiduously than necessitous 
free laborers. Ne.vt, with all this loss of effort 
still the labor of slaves is so profitable that 
their owners are tempted by their prosperity 
and the ease of obtaining a living, to be them- 
selves indolent and wasteful. These are ef- 
fects which every where follow similar causes. 
Their existence is ceitainlv a great detraction 
from what might otherwise be the profits of 
Southern agricultural industry and capital. 
But when this detraction is urged (as is con- 
tinually done) by the opposers of slavery to 
prove the evils of the system, they are in fact 
but asserting the truths that the fabors of the 
Southern sljives, in general, are lighter, and 
yet the profits of their owners greater, than in 
regard to the corresjionding classes of laborers 
and capitalists in Europe or the JS'orthern 
States. Korthern farmers who are now thriv- 
^^S by greater economy of labor and products 
■ would become bankrupt if subjected to the 
waste of both, which is general throughout 
^ the Southern States. These^evils are the effects 
certainly of slavery— but effects which are 
the strongest evidence of the greater benefits 
of the system, and of the falsehood of the 
.charges against it, as a question of profit for 
the proprietors, or of oppression and suffering 
of the slaves. 

Much is certainly wanting among the agri- 
cultural class of the Southern States, in edu'ca- 
tion and mental culture; and great have been 
and still remain the obstacles to the hio-her 
attainment of these benefits. This also is°one 
of the attendant minor evils of the institution 
of slavery, caused bv the necessary dispersed 
residences of the superior class of the popula- 
tion. Still, in no other class of cultivators of 
the soil, whether in this young and great con- 
federacy, or in old Europe, can there be found, 
in proportion to numbers, so much of mental 
improvement, enlargement of views, and <--ene- 
fal information, as in the Southern and slave- 
holding States. In no other agricultural class 
throughout the world, are better nurtured or I 
BO wed preserved, the purity of all the domes ' 
tic and family virtues of daughters, wives, and 
mothers. To the most intelligent and fair- 
judging of foreign travellers and visitors to 
our Southern country, who have hadopportu- 
luties to observe domestic manners and coun- 
try Bociety— whether such visitors were na- 
tives of Europe or of our Northern and slavery- 
hating States, nothing has seemed more mark- 
ed and peculiar than facts ob.scrved, which 
were but illustrations of the propositions I 
have asserted, and necessary results of our 
peculiar social position. Vet it has not oc- 
curred to these intelligent strangers, who have 
admired and eulogised the domestic manners 
«nd refinement ot the Southern country popu- 
lation, that the main cause, the essential 
loundution of the permanence of the peculiar 
merits which they witnessed with surprise and 
admiration, arc due to the institution of Afri- 
.can slavery. It is this institution, which by 
confining the drudgery and brutalizing effect^ 



of continued toil, or menial service, to the in- 
ferior race, (and of which the subjection, not- 
withstanding, has served greatly for its benefit 
and improvement,) gives to the superior race 
Jeisure and other means to improve mind, taste 
and manners. . In countries where domestic 
slavery does not exist, (or some equivalent 
condition of society, such as I will advert to ) 
and where the owners of the soil and all mem- 
bers of their families are necessarily laborers 
m the k.west departments or most degradin? 
menial services, there may be much industry 
greater economy and frugality, and iiossiblv 
(under the peculiarly favorable, though trail' 
sient circumstances of a newly settled territo- 
ry and cheap and fertile lands,) there may be 
even much general accumulation of profit and 
of wealth. But, nevertheless, such a popula-- 
tjon, of necessity, must be, or in a few creuera- 
tions will become, rude in manners, and great- 
ly deficient in refinement of feeling and culti- 
vation of mental and social qualities. Xo one 
appreciates more highly than myself the ad- 
vantages to a nation of producing and accumu- 
lating wealth by tlie individual members of 
the great community-, and especially, as the 
greatest public gain, the increase of a'.rricultu- 
ral production and riches. To advojkte and 
urge the forwarding of the latter results is the 
especial object of my present service and em- 
ployment, as it has been one of the most im- 
portant objects of all my public efforts and 
labors. Still, may God forbid that we should 

deem the accumulation of wealth even if 

from its most beneficial and best possible 
source, the fertdization and culture of the 
soil— as compensation for the loss or deteriora- 
tion of the mental and moral qualities of 
Southern men, and more especially of SoMtbern 
women ! And if brought to the hard necessi- 
ty of choosing between the two conditions, 
with their opposite disadvantages, I would not 
hesitate a moment to prefer the entire existing 
social, domestic, and industrial conditions of 
these slaveholding States, with all the now 
existing evils of indolence and waste and 
generally exhausting tillage and declining 
fertility, to the entire conditions of any other 
I country on the face of the globe. Our coun- 
try population would lose largely in grade by 
exchanging conditions with the industrious 
economical, and thrifty Flemish farmers— long 
and deservedly celebrated for the e.xcellence 
of their agriculture, and who yet, beyond the 
routine of their regular work, are almost as 
uninformed as their most ignorant hired labo- 
rers. Far worse would be a change to the 
condition of the proprietary class of France 
aniong whom land generally is so minutely 
subdivided, that its possession is usually ac- 
couipained by all the toils and privations of 
day-laborers lo the farmer and his family, and 
of course by the ignorance, coarseness of man- 
ners, and moral degradation, which are the 
necessary consequences of such iineeasing toil, 
exposure, and privations In Britain, it is 
true, that with much of gro.ss ignorance and 
rudeness of manners among the lower class of 
larnier.s, and with all the agricultural laborers 
there are, in the higher classes, both of pro- 



27 



prietors and tenants of lands, many persons of 
high intellectual attainments. But this ex- 
ception to the general rule is owing to the 
almost universal mode of tenure of the landed 
property in that country, and the usual sepa- 
ration of its possession, as capital, by men of 
wealth, and leisure, and the conducting of the 
cultivation by tenants uj>on rent. Even manj- 
tenants are men of wealth, who find it 
more profitable, as tenants, to conduct ver^- 
large agricultural operations and capital, 
than the being proprietors of small farms, 
and upon a necessaril}' very limited scale 
of operations. These causes are tliere fur- 
ther aided in operation by the high price 
of land, which keeps it in the possession of 
the wealthy and educated, and also the great 
plenty and clieapness, and degradation, of 
agricultural labor — much chea]ier in that 
thickly po|(ulated country- than our slave la- 
bor. Of tliese several conditions of Brilishl 
agriculture, serving to improve and refine the 
higher rural or agricultural classes, and only 
the higher classes, not one exists m this coun- 
try, or possibly can occur for centuries to come. 

In the Northern and jSorthwestern States 
of the confederac}', tliere are also to be found, ' 
(as yet, though they must certainly and soon i 
disappear,) many proprietors and cultivators 
of land who are men of education and intelli- 1 
gence, and whose wives and daughters have a 
high degree of refinement of manners. Buti 
in nearly every such case, it will be found 
that this intelligence and refinement were de- 
rived fron; some previous and dilfeient train-! 
ing and position; and that these qualities' 
have been so fai- retained in agricultural life 
by the laige agriculliu-al profits and accumu- 
lations of wealth available in a newly settled' 
couutrj". But even now, the general condition I 
of the agricultural class in these non-slave- 
holdir.g States is much lowered, and tending! 
to whdt must be liereafter a state of general 
and deep degradation, in intellectual and so- 
cial qualities. And with them, the degrada-! 
tiou will not stop when as low as that of the! 
tenantry of England, or of the boors who reap 
rich harvests from the fat soil of Belgium. I 
The comparative poverty of soil in the older! 
Korthem Stsitcs, and the general and repeated I 
divisions of pro[)ecty tlicrein, by inheritance, 
indicate a future condition of the proprietors 
more like to that of the wretched and igno- ' 
rant proprietary class of France. I 

Even now, it is comparatively a rare easel 
in the Korthern States to find, what is so com- 
mon in the Southern, a highly intelligent njan, 
with a well educated and refined family, all 
natives of and still residing in the countrj-, 
and belonging strictly to theagiicultural class. 
Such persons have little'inducement to remain 
in (and still less to commence) country life 
and agricultural employments in the Korthern 
States. And sliould any such, percliauce, be 
so situated, they must either abandon their 
pursuits and their locality, or be' content that 
their children shall sink to the general level 
of the surrounding residents, in coarse man- 
ners and uncultivated intellect. A sufficient 
proof of the working of this law of circum- 



stances is presented continually to the world 
in the contrast of the representation in Con- 
gress from the rural districts of the Northern 
and Southern States respectively. The most 
distinguished men, and especially' statesmen, 
of the South, h'ive ivs often (at least) been na- 
tives and continued residents of the country 
as of towns — and in talent and in numbers 
they have far exceeded all from the North in 
our public councils. In the Northern States 
there are, indeed, man\ men of the highest 
talents, ediu-ation, and learning — and, it may 
be, in the latter tesjjects exceeding an}- in the 
South, because of the greater advantages of- 
fered by great cities for literary and scientific 
pursuits. But these great or learned men are 
either produced in or gathered to the great 
cities only. They are men who have acquired 
theirjust renown either iislawyers, physicians, 
divines, or professors in scientific and literary 
institutions. All of great intcllectna! jiower 
that now exists in the gieat .States of Massa- 
chusetts, Kew Yiirk, and Pennsylvania, is to 
be found in their populous cities onl^- — and 
almost exclusively in their respective great 
capitals. Some truly great men may be (and 
sometimes are) furnished from these cities to < 
aid the public councils. But never does one 
such come from all tlie twenty-fold ^rreater 
country and village constituencies — which 
even wiieu disposed thus to honoi- the liighest 
talent, (which is not often the case, either in 
town or country — North or South) — could not 
jjossibly find among themselves anj* high 
talent to honor. The diiTcrenec between the 
intellectual conditions of the Niirthein and 
Southern agricultural jjopiilation, istlie cause 
of the usual long existing and well known 
commanding infiuence in the Federal Govern- 
ment of the Soutliern States, through their 
representative.-^, in whatever measuiws of na- 
tional policy ai e directed by wisdom, or in- 
tellect, or for the benefit of general interests. 
But we are now much the weakest in votes; 
and in whatever of public policy is connected 
with sectional interests, or slili baser private 
self-interest, supeiior intellect has no influence, 
and we are governed by the brute force and 
cupidity of superior numbers. 

The peculiar defects of Northern agricul- 
tural labor in its inlluence on social and do- 
mestic relations, do not (^as yet) I'orbid great 
pecuniary success in agricultural put suits. In- 
deed, when no far-reaching intellectual power 
is required to devise or direct a system of cul- 
ture or improvement, or wliile enough of such 
direction, derived from former inlbienees, yet 
remains in operatifjn, the leturns of agricul- 
tural cj'.pital are even inerea,-ed by the exist- 
ing condition of things in the Nortliern States. 

A farmer or planter of the South, not rich, 
but in independent and comfortable circum- 
stances, gives a ]iortion of liis time to social 
and mental occupation. Perliajis his whole 
object in seeking such relaxation is present en- 
joyment. But the final result is not the less 
improvement of wind ar.d maiuiers. His sons 
and daughters grow up under these advan- 
tages and influences of social communication. 
And, if, in the end, because of such iudul- 



28 



geiices of a family, even tbougli moderately 
and properly enjoyed, there may be less money 
accumulated, there will be acquired other 
values much more than compensating the dif- 
ference of pecuniary gains. Elwood Fisher, (in 
his excellent lecture on "The North and the 
South,") has observed most truly that the or- 
dinary social intereourse of the people of the 
South serves admirably as a school of instruc- 
tion. Quoting by memory only from this pro- 
found thinker and able advocate of Southern 
institutions and rights, I am not sure whether 
I am indebted directly to his expressions, or 
indirectly, (b}' deduction from them) for the 
opinion which will be here added — that his 
social school, in its ojieration for improving 
manners and morals, for enlarging observation 
and thought, anil for affording general ar.d 
useful information is far better than the much 
lauded common school education of the New 
England States. Spelling, reading, and com- 
mon arithmetic are indeed necessary and ex- 
cellent first steps ill the pursuit of useful in- 
struction and knowledge. But he who .goes 
no farthei- in the pursuit, might as well have 
not moved at all. 

A farmer of New York or Penn.sylvania, in 
like moderate, but independent circumstances 
as to amount of pi-operty to those just sup 
posed for the Southerner, ^jvould be compelled 
to be one of his own continual laborers. Ilis 
■wife would be the most unceasing drudge on 
the farm. His sons, and not less his daughters, 
would be brought up to continued labor in 
the lowest and most repulsive employments, 
and without any improving social intercourse, 
because its cost could not be affoi'ded. Under 
such circumstances, aided by the usual accom- 
paniments of indu.-tiy, frugality, and parsimo- 
nious expenditure, wealth may and probably 
"will be increased. But t''e possessors will 
seek and tind nearly all their objects and pleas- 
ures in such accumulation, and they, or the 
next generation, will deseond as miicli in re- 
finement and intellect, as the stock of wealth 
may be increased. Such a proprietor, in mere 
money valuation, is just so much the richer 
as the value of the wages of himself, his wife, 
and his children, as day-laborers on the farm, 
or servants in the house. A life of continued, 
moderate, and regular labor, is not a life of 
pain. AVhen encouraged by the prospect, and 
rewarded by the fruition of gain, it becomes 
a life of pleastire. Thus the accumulation of 
wealth, by an industrious Northern farmer, 
does not u^uallj' induce .Mny intermission of hi.- 
early labor.--, or eiiango the habits, labors, or 
training of liis children. When ho may have 
acquired .?l)(),(i()U worth of property, he con- 
tinues to labor as steadily, and to live nearly 
as mdely, as when urder the pressure of his 
early poverty. His son still drives hisfatherV 
wagon or his hogs to market — in no way dis- 
tinguished in appearance or habits from the 
other hired laborers. His wife is still the 
most laborious domestic drud^. His daugh- 
tere have no iinpi-oving society, and their daily 
and continuous employments are those of me- 
nial servants — whose services it would be too 
costly to liire. 



This is the general condition to which agri- 
cultural society and manners must tend, are 
tending, and have already reached to great 
extent, in the older non slaveholding States. 
This is the condition from which we are saved, 
and immeasurably exalted, by the subjection 
and slavery- of an inferior race. The superior 
race here is truly free. In the so-called free 
countries, the far greater number of the supe- 
rior I'ace is, in effect, enslaved, and thereby 
degraded to a condition suitable only for a 
race made inferior bj' nature. There exists 
slavery, or the subjection of man to man, iu 
ever}' country under the sun, excej)t, perhaps, 
the most barbarous and ignoi'ant. In these 
Southern States we have the slavery of indi- 
vidual to individual, and of a naturally infe- 
rior to a naturally superior race; which, of 
all, is the condition best for both masters and 
slaves. In the so-called free countries, in ad- 
dition to tlie sometimes most oppressive lule 
of a despotic and grinding government — or it 
maj- be under free constitui ional government — 
there is the slavery of class to class — of the 
starving laborers to the paying eiupluyers. 
Hunger and cold are the most exacting of ail 
task-masters. The victims of hunger and cold 
are always, and of necessit\', slaves to their 
wants, and through them, to those who onlj^ 
can su])ply their wants. The great argument 
urged by English and Northern advocates for 
the abolition of our system of slavery, (while 
totally regardless of tiieir own.) is that hired 
labor is clicaper than slave labor. And this 
is unquestionably true, as to both Old Eng- 
land and New England, and all other coun- 
tries where the formerly existing domestic 
slavery has been abolished, because (and only 
because) it had ceased to be the most profita- 
ble to the slaveholders. Whenever continued 
severe suffering from hunger and cold, and 
the number of the sufferers, compel the desti- 
tute class to compete eagerly witii each other 
in lowering the wages of their labor to obtain 
bread, then the payment for such labor of so- 
called free men necessarily becomes cheaper 
than Would be the support of a domestic slave. 
Of course, if domestic slavery then remained' 
in that country, tiie owners of slaves would 
hasten to get rid of them, and to employ, in- 
stead, the cheaper laborers furni.shed and 
tasked and driven by hunger and cold. Thus, 
and for these reasons, acted our English ances- 
tors, when muinnuitting their white slaves. 
Thus, and still better for their own interest, 
did our Northern brethren. For when con- 
vinced that domestic slavery was too costly 
in their wintry region, they first sold their 
negro slaves to the Ir^outh, and while thereaf- 
ter avoiding their costly use, they continued, 
as long as jjermitted by law, to "steal" new 
supplies from Africa to sell to the Southerw 
States. If the former Sc>utherii demand for 
Africans still existed, and the African slave- 
trade was open by law — or if it were safe and 
profitable to violate the now prohibitory 
law — enough of our Northern bretiiren would 
1)0 now as rea<ly iis ever to sujiply the demand. 
And if their access to the coast of Africa was 
prevented, they would be as willing, (if safe 



29 



and profitable,) to supply all the South with intellectual powers, or popular influence, 
slaves, by kidnapping the Bubjects of their there is collected an enormously predomina- 
now much desired ally, the negro Emperor of i ting number of ignorant, needy, and unprin- 
Hayti. cipled men — when a very laige proportion 

Nearly all of the many vessels which have of tlie populatioji of these citit-s is composed 
been engaged iu the African slave-trade, in lof newly arrived foreigners, often vicious and 
violation of the prohibitory laws of the United i turbulent, and neces.-arily unacquainted with 
States, were fitted out for that purpose from the principles of free government, and unused 
Northern ports and by Nortliern capital, and [to freedom in any form — I say, it is certain, 



were manned by Northern crews. This trade, 
since being pro'.iibited and made piracy by 
our laws, has been carried on to supply slaves 
to Cuba and Brazil, with incomparably more 
inhumanity and cruelty, than attended tlie 
formerly' legalized and regulated traffic. From 
time to time we have seen announced the de- 
tection of sundrj- vessels or persons engaged 
in this now illegal and atrocious business of 
torture and murder in the sea voyage; and 
legal proceedings have i>fteu been commenced 



in sucli circumstances as these, that the body 
of the people will be directed, governed, and 
in t;fl'ect enslaved b\' a few master-minds — and 
these minds generally acting solely for the 
promotion of base self-interest and personal 
aggrandizement. No safe-guards in written 
constitutions can preserve such a people from 
being made the tools and slaves of able politi- 
cal knaves and unscrupulous demagogues. 
With such population of both towns and coun- 
try — with such influences at work, and their 



against the supposed offenders in the North- 1 tendencies — with such unpri:icipled leadei'3 



ern cities to which they respectively belonged. 
But iu not one such case have I ever heard of 
the conviction, followed by due punishment, 
of any of these worst of criminals. And when 
such detection of these acts of legal piracy 
are announced in Northern newspapers, it is 
usually done in as few words as would serve 
for any other commercial occurrence of inno- 
cent or legal character. Yet, besides the ille- 
gality of the trade, any one such voyage, 
made by the order and funds of merchants of 
a Northern city, would furnish more true facts 
of suffering, crime, and horror, than could 
possibly occur among all the slaves in the 
Southern Stales in the same length of time. 
No furious, popular, and philanthropic indig- 
nation has been arouse<l against these detected 
pirates; neither the crews and their comman- 
ders, nor the rich capitalists, who were the 
owners and real traders, torturers, and mur- 
derers. The great gain of the trade seems to 
serve as a veil and excuse for its deep iniquity. 
D'Wolf, who wasoiieof the great slave-trading 
capitalists of Rhode Island, (while the trade 
was yet legal,) was not, therefore, the less a 
leading mau of that State — as is evident from 
his having been subsequently elected by its 
Legislature to the Senate of the United States. 
If anj' such African slave-trader had lived in 
the Southern States, all his wealth would not 
have lifted him to a respectable position; and 
he could not have obtained the lowest ofiice, 
from either people or Government, as readily 



and managers, and such followers — in the 
great State of New York, political liberty, in 
effect, is already at an end ; and individual 
property, and even life, are unsafe. If the 
doors of every dwelling-house in the Southern 
country were left nightly with.out locks, or 
bolts, and if everj- slave on each farm had 
full command of deadly weapons, (and both 
such circumstances, in effect, are real in innu- 
merable and continuing cases,) our ('ropeity 
and our lives would be much safer from any 
attempts thereon by our slaves, than soon 
will be the jiroperty and lives of the rich 
people of New York from their desli lute fel- 
low-citizens, notwitlista:iding all the protec- 
tion afforded by the constitution and laws of 
their nominal free govei'iin:ent. Indeed, the 
beginning of this terril)le consummation is 
ah'tady clearly indicated in the successiul pro- 
gress of the antr-rent-paying combination and 
movement of the State of New York. For 
many years, numerous occupiers of rented 
lands have openly and avowedly leagued to 
withhold the payment of the rents due to the 
proprietors, and yet hold to the land. The 
laws have been trampled upon by this feloni- 
ous league, and the decrees of courts frus- 
trated or silenced. The agents of the pro- 
prietors and creditors have been outrageously 
maltreated, (as would have been the princi- 
pals, had they dared to appear,) and the offi- 
cers of justice, when attempting to enforce 
legal processes, have been resisted by ar^ng. 



as did his compeer of PJiode Island attain the and in some cases have been murdered by 
highest official station, and, I suppose, the these defiers of the laws. Growing more 



highest estimation, in slavery-hating and pu- 
ritanical New England. 



powerful and bold with time and success, 
these anti-renters have assumed a political 



There are stilK)ther kinds of slavery besides I position and organization, and thus exercise 
those produced by force, and by want and i great influence in state elections. And as a 
suffering. General igr.orance leads to the crowning act of triumph, they were enabled 
corruption of a people, and of subjection of ito secure the election of a candidate for the 
mind to mind. And tliis kind of slavery, as Chief ilagistracy, upon the understood en- 



it is in eftect, tending to the most awful polit- 
ical and national evils, is already growing rap- 
idly in the so-called free Northern States. It 
is iu their circumstances — of the land culti- 
vated and owned by an unenlightened and 
still deteriorating rural population — of large 
cities, in which, with a few men of liighest 



ement of that candidate that lie would 
prostitute his pardoning power as governor, 
to discharge from the State's prison some of 
the most desperate felons of the anti-rent 
party, who by rare chance had been convicted 
and sentenced to punishment iu that confine- 
ment. Whether this corrupt and most vile 



)0 



pledge had been expressly given or not, it ' these Southern States, it will not only be the 
was charged as being understood, and was I utter ruin of these States, but one of the 
acted upon by the anti-renters — and was i heaviest blows to the well-being of the world, 
faithfully redeemed by the governor so the most powerful obstacle to the settlement, 
elected, by his speedy pardon of the villain- culture, civilization, and higliest improvement 



ous criminals, for wliom his aid had beeu thus 
sought to be purchased. 

Faris it fiom my intention to stigmatize any 
of our po[)ulation upon tiie ground of foreign 
birth. ■ We should value men for their known 
merits, and not for their places of nativity-. 
We ougiit to feel even the more indebted to a 
good citizen, or a public benefactor, if a for- 
eigner, who had sought our land and Govern- 
ment from pieference, tlian if the mere accident 
of native birth had jilaced him in our country. 
Hence we are the more indebted for the ser- 
vices and talent and the patriotism of Mont- 
gomerj', Charles Lee, Hamilton, Lafayette, 
Kosciusko, Pulaski, and Gallatin, as foreigners, 
than if liiey had been among us b}'^ birth, in- 
stead of by preference. To hundreds of thou- 
sands of immigrants from Europe our country 
has beeu greatly indebted for their useful pri- 
vate or public lives. But i speak of classes, 
and not of individuals — of the general rule, 
and not of its exceptions. Taken altogether, 
the recent and present immigration from Eu- 
rope is lower in intelligence than the lowest 
class of native citizens, and immeasurably in- 
ferior in knowledge aiid ap{>reciation of the 
principles of free government. An infusion of 
such new population, amounting to a small 
minority only, could do no political harm. 
But the danger of prospective evil is enormous, 
when this new population can control entire 
States; and, if not able to elect a President, 
is so powerful as to be otl'ered bribes for that 
purpose by every ambitious and unprincipled 
seeker of the oltice, who can so intiuenee 
the legislation of tlie Congress'of the United 
States. 

The pretended philanthrojiists of the North- 
ern Stales are well aware ui the effects which 
the success of their ettorts for the abolition of 
Southern slavery would produce. The Wil- 
berforces andClarksons and Benezets of former 
times d'lubtless were deceived, and believed 
all they professed as to the ex[)ected beneficial 
results of negro emaucipalion. But since the 
e.v'periment of Hayti, now of more than sixty 
years' standing, and of otliers of later date, in 
the Britisii West Indies, and all tiie latter made 
with the utmost care, and under the most 
favorable aus[)ices, no abolitionists of good 
sense and information can bcHeve in the bene- 
fits of emancipation even to the slaves them- 
Belvea, or in tiie fitness of the negro race for 
freedom and self-government. The present 
leaders in thisNortliern warfare against Souih- 
•ru slavery are actuated niucii less by love for 
the slaves than by hatred for iheir masters. 
Their lust for political power is a still stronger 
operating motive than either. Tiioy know 
thai the complete fruition of their machina- 
tions would be to reduce the Southern States 
to the condition of Jamaica, if not to the still 
worse state of Hayti. If they, or other as 
malignant and more jiowerful enemies, sliould 



of all this western continent, and the exten- 
sion of free government and the true princi- 
{)les of freedom among all tlie superior races 
capable of appreciating and preserving those 
blessings. And even the Northern States, all 
of which are now desirous, if not striving for 
the abolition of slavery in the South, would 
be, next to the Southern States, the greatest 
Itfsers by that result, both in their pe'cuniary 
interests and political safety. 

If there is any existing institution of divine 
origin, and manifestly designed and used by 
the all-wise and all-good Creator to forward 
his beneficent purposes, slavery, and especially 
African domestic slaver}', rs such an institu- 
tion. Personal slavery has existed from the 
earliest known existeuce of society. Slaves 
were held by the most virtuous and the most 
favored of God's ancient worshippers and ser- 
vants. Slavery has ever been the means, if it 
is not the only possible means, of civilizing 
barbarous tribes and regions, spreading the 
culture of the earth, and instructing the most 
ignorant and degraded races of men. Still 
better and peculiar features belong to African 
slaveiy, under civilized and white masters. 
By this, a race made inferior by nature, and 
always enslaved to barbarous and cruel mas- 
ters, was raised greatly in the scale of comfort 
and liap[)iness, as well as of improvement. 
Civilization and Christianity have thus been 
communicated to millions, who otherwise 
would never have heaid of either. By aid of 
negro slavery only, could these Southern 
States, and still more the tropical regions of 
America, have been settled and cultivated by 
the white race. All that has been done in the 
South, and much of all done even in the 
Northern States, for industrial and moral ira- 
l)rovement, refinement, and even religion, has 
been more or less due to the existence of 
African slavery. For even all the older North- 
ern Stales had the benefit of this insti'.ution 
at first, when it was most needed, and retained 
it as long as it continued to be beneficial, and 
until the now fast growing slavery to want 
began to operate as a substitute. 

It is true that the institution of slavery is 
attended by many and great particular evils. 
And where is the great social institution wliieh 
is not? Even in the Messed relntions of hus- 
band and wife, and of parent and child, there 
are cases of great uiiluij)[iiness and evil, and 
crime, growing out of these very relations. 
Yet, because there are husbands and wives, 
and parei;ts and children, who are monsters 
in human shape, and who can avail themselves 
of these respective characters to perpetrate the 
most h(irril)le crimes, and inflict the direst 
calamities on helpless and innocent sufferers, 
who would, tiierefore, condemn, and strive to 
abolisli, the institution of marriage, or the sub- 
jection of children to ]iarent»? The legal in- 
titution of apprenticeship, prevailing amonj 



ever succeed in abolishing this institution in | every civilized and refined people, is precisely 



31 



slavery, only limited in the time of duration. 
In this generally beneficial relation of master 
and apprentice — and not less among the North- 
ern philanthropists than elsewhere — there oc- 
cur numerous cases of great injustice and 
cruelty, and of extreme and unmerited suffer- 
ing. Yet, who, among these even sincere wor- 
shippers of a sickly philanthi'opy, has proposed 
as the proper safeguard against such particular 
cases of oppression and crime, the abolition 
of the entire system of apprenticeship. 

Judging from the early existence and con- 
tinued duration of the institution of domestic 
slavery — its almost universal extension — its 
beneficial influence in subduing barbarism and 
savage indolence and ignorance — in inducing 
the culture and improvement of the earth, and 
promoting the industry, civilization, refinement 
and general well-being of mankind — it seems 
to me an inevitable deduction, that the insti 
tution of slavery is as surely and manifestly 
established by the wise and Jbenevolent design 



of God, as the institution of marriage and of 
parental rule — and it is next to these, and in- 
ferior to these only, in producing important 
benefits to mankind. To the direct aid of do- 
mestic slavery, every cultivated portion of the 
earth, owes its first improvemenr, and every 
civilized people their first emerging from bar- 
barism. The only exceptions to the existence 
(past or present) and operation of this great 
element of improvement, are to be found among 
the most rude and ignorant of savage tribes, 
such as the aboriginal inhabitants of North 
America and Australia. And if it had ever 
been, since the creation of man, that all man- 
kind had been sunk in that lowest depth of 
barbarism, they would have so continu jd to 
this day, if without the aid of the institution 
of domestic slavery, for their improvement, or 
otherwise, the still more direct exercise of the 
miraculous, as well as^benevolent power of 
Almighty God. 



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